July 20, 2025 • 28 mins
Newt talks with veteran political reporter Salena Zito about her new book, “Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America’s Heartland.” Their discussion centers around the assassination attempt on Donald J. Trump during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13th, 2024. Zito, who was present at the event, shares her firsthand experience and insights into the incident, the subsequent reactions, and the profound impact on Trump and the American electorate. Their conversation explores themes of place, faith, and resilience, highlighting Zito's unique perspective on middle America's relationship with Trump. Her book, which has reached the New York Times Bestseller list, delves into the untold stories of the heartland and Trump's journey back into the electorate's favor. They also discuss the challenges faced by the Secret Service during the event and the broader implications for journalism and political coverage.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
On this episode of News World one year ago. On
July thirteenth, twenty twenty four, Donald J. Trump, then a
former president of the United States and presumptive nominee of
the Republican Party in the twenty twenty four presidential election,
survived an assassination attempt while speaking at an open air
campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania. There are moments that define America.
(00:28):
The late afternoon hours of July thirteenth, twenty twenty four
was one of them.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
In her new book Butler, The Untold.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Story of the near Assassination of Donald Trump and the
Fight for America's Heartland, Selina Zeito writes a narrative of
that fateful day and describes the people of the Heartland
and the untold story of how the President found his
way back into the heart of the electorate. I have
to say in welcoming my guest, I've regard her as
(00:57):
one of the finest reporters in the country, somebody with
unusual knowledge, and as she and I were chatting, somebody
whose family goes back to the very beginning of Butler,
and so her ties to that region are amazing. But
on anything, she writes, I personally recommend Selena Zito as
a remarkable reporter and a great analyst.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Selena, welcome and thank you for joining me on New World.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Oh my goodness, thank you so much. It's such an
automist speaker. I really appreciate you taking time to do this.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
You know, it's sort of amazing. I didn't realize till
later that you were only a few feet from President
Trump when the shots rang out.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
I mean, what was that like?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, in that moment, people often say when they are
in a tragic situation or they're in a perilous situation,
the time slows down, and that was also the case
for me, and I remember thinking everything is happening in layers.
That's what it felt like. That's the only way I
can describe it. When I saw him again, I'm just
(02:09):
a few feet away. I had just seen him six
minutes earlier in what's called the click area, which is
behind the stage. It's a curtained off area. It's a
place where the President shakes hands, gives a lot of
hogs to state troopers, paramedics, firemen, right the people that
serve the community. And I was supposed to fly to
(02:31):
Bedminster with him along with my daughter to do an
interview with him about Pennsylvania, and he just wanted to
say hi. Well, because we were backstage and I can
hear the Lee Greenwood music starting up, they made my
daughter and myself just go in the buffer. The buffer
is the area that surrounds the stage, so that's why
(02:55):
we were just feet away. In fact, if you look
at the covered Butler took that photo and it have
a lot of significance to it. There's a reason I
chose one that didn't have his face. I chose one
that showed him looking at the people there and them
looking back at him. And that's really at the heart
(03:15):
of the entire journey of this book, not just that moment,
but the rest of the campaign and what happens going forward.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
I have to ask, how old is your daughter?
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Thirty eight?
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Oh, this must have been there. She was a mom
at the center of history.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yeah, she's a photo journalist. We do a lot of
work together. She's also the mother of my four grandchildren.
So we follow him out. She's taking the photos. I'm
doing video just with my phone. People look at my
Twitter account that day they can see that. And then
we make our way off to the side of the podium,
and he does two things that he never does. A
(03:56):
chart comes down, and I remember turning to my daughter
and saying, you will totally get this. I mean, what
does he think he is ross pro? Why does he
have this chart? If he ever has a chart, the
chart is on the other side, and it's at the end.
But that is also a very rare occurrence. And then
(04:17):
he turns his neck away from the people at the rally.
Why is that significant? If you've ever watched in great
detail to a Trump rally on television, or you've ever
attended one, the relationship between him and the people attending
is very transactional. They feed off of him, he feeds
(04:37):
off of them, and they all show respect to each
other by never turning away from each other. And he
turns to his neck away from the rally. It's in
those moments that four pops go right over my head.
I know immediately it's gun shots a gun owner. And
I remember in the moment watching him grow I have
(05:00):
his ear, seeing the blood and seeing the Secret Service
rush him right in a protective stance. I remember thinking
I have purpose here. I am a journalist. God gave
me a gift, and I'm a witness to history, and
I need to be on top of my game. I'm
never thinking I'd be writing a book about it, but
(05:21):
knowing that I had to chronicle it as a journalist
and be responsible. So I stood there. I didn't get down,
and as the Secret Service are surrounding him, the second
round of gunfire goes over our heads. But he is
now protected. I mean, they're putting their life in front
of him at this moment, and I am watching him
(05:47):
kneel down on his own, So I calculate, Okay, in
this moment, I at least know that he is not
gravely hit. I see the blood, but I know that
he was able to get down on his own. He
didn't get knocked down, he didn't fall down, he didn't collapse.
After the second round goes out. Michelle Picard the third
(06:09):
he was the President's campaign advance man for the event.
He just takes me down and lays on top of
me in a protective stance. In doing that, I'm just
in this unique position where I can see the President's
face through the feet of the Secret Service. I can
(06:31):
see him moving, I can see him talking. I can
hear him talking. I have my recorder on, so I
also have it, and I have my recorder on, because
when I go to a Trump rally, oftentimes I find
them to be covered without nuance, without context, and so
his words are used flatly as opposed to missing the
(06:53):
nuance of when he says it. Missing the cadence was
when he says something, and so I always recorded any ways,
and I hear them talking, I understand the shooter is down.
That's when Michelle Leicard finally gets off of me. That
is when I hear him talking about his shoes, which
(07:15):
I can laugh about now, but it's kind of funny.
He's insistent that he gets his shoes on. Why are
his shoes off? When they surrounded him, they knocked his
shoes off. The crowds start shouting USA, he mouths it,
I can't hear his voice. Project. He gets up on
his own and he still surrounded and they want to
(07:36):
take him off stage, and he goes, wait, wait, wait,
He turns around and says, fight, fight, fight. Now you
have to think about that moment. People wonder, why do
you do that? Well, you'll find out in the book
the next day and we can talk about it why
he did actually do it. But you also, if you're
watching the video of it, the crowd's comportment completely changes,
(08:01):
and there is a calmness there you would not likely
expect when you see a president's shop before your eyes
in front of fifty thousand people. But the way that
the people comported themselves, the way that they exited, is
something that is very underreported and very powerful. And even
(08:22):
in the hours afterwards, they didn't let us go for
two hours. The parking lot. If there's fifty thousand people there,
there's at least fifteen to twenty thousand cars, right, maybe
people goes and twos or threes, whatever. And so they're
out there in that big old farm field, and you
(08:45):
were born in Pennsylvania, you know exactly what that Abalachian
farmfield is like. They're out there, hugging each other, giving
each other water, people at coolers were sharing food, they
were singing. It was all very very beautiful moment, which
is why I take issue with an interview that was
(09:06):
done the other day with Chuck Dodd where he was
saying a reporter who covered it said he had PTSD
from this crowd. I don't know what crowd he was seeing,
but it certainly wasn't the crowd that attended that event.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I think that's a crazy comment.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
I have other words, but this is a family say them.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
So. At that moment, though, you're seeing the president walk
off and what I think is one of the most
iconic moments in American campaign history. I went that night
on Hannadhim talked about the notion that this was a
providential event because if he turned one second later, he'd.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Have been dead.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
His courage and his self awareness in immediately coming back
and chanting fight, fight, fight with a raised fist. That
was astonishing. What was your reaction in real time as
you were the.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Nothing surprised me in that moment, like in the way
he handled that nothing. People will find out in the
book many details that they don't know about that. He
called me the next morning, bright and early, and he
calls me and says, Selena, this is President Donald Trump.
Almost like laughed because like, of course you are President
(10:24):
Donald Trump, right, who doesn't know that voice? But before
I could even say a word, he said, I want
to make sure that you and your daughter are okay.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:34):
And I really apologize for not being able to do
that interview with you.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
And I store like a truck driver and said, are
you bleeping kidding me? Sir, you've just been shot. I'm
not worried about an interview. He would go on to
call me seven times that day.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
We had some very very profound discussions, just two people talking,
trying to figure out what happened, why it happened, why
he did what he did, God and faith and purpose.
I suppose if I were a better reporter, I would
oppressed him. I could tell he was going through something
(11:16):
and he needed to talk to someone who was there,
not family members. Family members aren't going to understand this
because they love him, but they weren't there. And he
and I have mutual respect for each other because of
the way he treats the people in the middle of
the country, and he knows me. I've interviewed him dozens
of times. I led him because I needed it too,
(11:40):
to just figure things out. I wasn't supposed to be
where he was either, right, I was supposed to interview
him earlier than day. I wasn't supposed to be standing
a few feet away from him. The conversations centered on purpose,
on faith, on God, on what his obligation is. Because
he was spared, and the last thing we talked about.
(12:04):
I asked him, I said, I gotta ask you, Sarah,
why'd you say fight, fight, fight? And he said, you know, Selena.
To be honest, I wasn't Donald Trump in that moment.
I was representing everything about the country and the presidency,
and I had an obligation to show strength and that
(12:26):
we will endure and that we will go on and
nothing will take us down. And I needed to represent
that grit, that American exceptionalism because I knew if I didn't,
it could have dire consequences for the people that are there,
but also people in the country. I needed to project
(12:48):
that strength, and that's why I did it.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
I talked with Speaker Johnson, who happened to be Admiral
Largo when the second shooter was discovered at the golf course,
and he was there when they came in to tell
him that there was a second potential shooter, and Mike
told me that they went off to a private room
and they prayed for about two hours. Don't you think
(13:30):
this was a transformative event for Trump himself?
Speaker 3 (13:34):
I have seen it in him every day and people
will say, well, he's this, well, he's that, and I
will argue that there is a profound difference in him
in the way that he has conducted his presidency in
terms of understanding that every single second of every day
(13:54):
counts and he has to get things done to preserve
the country and to make the country strong. But I've
also seen moments of faith that a lot of people
don't see. On Wednesday, I mean Pittsburgh, we have this
extraordinary energy conference and I'm set to interview the President.
(14:16):
While first before then it ends up happening to be after.
I think he and I have this thing that it
happens like that, right, And we're doing the interview, and
I'm with the photographer. I'm not going to use his
name protect his privacy, but I went with the photographer
that I use almost all the time outside of my
daughter to photograph the president. What would do the interview.
He's a very good photographer and President knows him as well.
(14:41):
Before the interview, the photographer tells me that his father
has been diagnosed with a terminal illness and his father
loves President Trump. And I have a copy of my
book with me, so at the end of the interview,
I said, it's the President. I need to ask you
a favor. Hees, Zito, you never asked me a favor,
and I said, I know, sir, but my photographer, who
(15:03):
you know very well, his father had received some bad
health news and he's a really really big fan of yours,
and I suspect that this would lift his spirits if
you sign my book. President takes his kind of course,
I'll sign your book. And as he signs the book,
he looks up at the photographer and you could tell
that the photographer is very emotionally reacted to this, and
(15:26):
he said, look, get that video thing rolling. I'll do
you one better, and he does this beautiful moment, a
video message to the photographer's father, and the first thing
he says is you have a good boy. Now what
father doesn't want to hear that about their son. Your
(15:48):
son worked hard. I see him working hard all the time.
That alone was profound because that's a father talking to
another father. And then he says God works in ways
we don't and always understand, so have faith. And I
look forward to meeting you. And I looked up and
(16:08):
you've been in those clique rooms, right, it's mostly staff
and secret service. And there was not a dry eye
in that room. And so when people ask me about
faith and God and the President, and they are very
skeptical of it, I always remind them that your belief
in a higher power, your belief in God, doesn't mean
(16:30):
you have to go around and shout it. Sometimes for
people it's very very private, but it is always profound
and meaningful.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
I want to take you back.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
In my limited experiences with President Trump, I've shared almost
one hundred percent of what you have said about him,
in the ways he's not understood by.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
The elite media.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
I want to take you right back to Butler. I mean,
you're an eyewitness to history. I've never seen this Secret
Service look more incompetent than they did in that whole
experience with this guy who apparently wanders in with a
rangefinder then wanders back in later. The whole notion that
(17:13):
they didn't cover the roof because it was too sloped,
the excuses just strike me as being almost something from
a comedy movie.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
I mean, we had congressmen days afterwards climbing up on
that sloped roof who are not spring chickens. Our men
and women in the field are very fit people. Right,
There's several things that went wrong First of all, there
is this archaic role in the Secret Service that former
(17:43):
presidents and or candidates do not get the same amount
of protection that the current president has. Now, that's kind
of silly. Donald Trump at that time was very different
than Jimmy Carter right, or Bill Clinton, or George W.
(18:03):
Bush or Barack Obama. He's in the middle of a campaign,
he is the presumptive nominee. We're in a polarizing world,
and he's getting essentially the same kind of protective stance
that any other former president would get. Well, they're not
doing rallies. And well, Barack Obama every once in a
while will do a rally, but they're not doing rallies.
(18:26):
We are in a very polarizing time. There are times
when leadership needs to make decisions that go outside of
rules that don't meet the moment. The other problem is
there was no communication between local law enforcement and the
Secret Service. Now, you and I both know that a
(18:50):
local law enforcement member man or woman, they know their
hometown and all the nooks and cranny and all the
places where all the vulnerabilities, more so than even the
most studied agent who would possibly miss something that's a
(19:10):
potential threat. I remember pulling up to the event, and
when you're a journalist, you've got to be there so early.
And I remember pulling up and looking up at the
water tower. I didn't look just up, but I also
looked down to see if someone was just protecting the
access to the water tower. Because the water tower, which
(19:34):
sort of loomed not that far away over the farm
field the ladder to go up, you couldn't see that
from the vantage point. So I remember thinking, they'll get
to that later. I mean, someone either needs to be
at the bottom or someone needs to be up there,
because this is a big vulnerability. And I didn't think
(19:55):
about it again. But there's so many outcroppings of trees
that's rounded this farmfield. There's so many outbuildings, right this
is a farm show where people show things livestock in
different buildings, and they're peppered all across the place, and
there were a lot of them that weren't covered, including
the one that Thomas Matthew Crooks climbed on top of.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Do you think that was just a bureaucratic error.
Speaker 3 (20:20):
I think it had a lot to do with leadership decisions.
I struggled to think of the men and women who
were in the field that day, not the decision makers,
but the guys who do the field work. I struggled
to believe that they made that decision.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Who are without Adele, the most astute and insightful student
of sort of Middle American relations to Donald Trump?
Speaker 2 (21:04):
And you caught this rhythm, I.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Think, very early for his entire career, all the years
we've now known him. And you describe at one point
this trip you took with him a couple of weeks
before Butler, where he's just wandering around small towns. I
have a sense that, probably more than any other reporter
in the country, you have a sense of the rhythm
of what's behind all this.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Yes, so a lot of the theme throughout the book,
and it's a theme the journalists that live in DC
or New York miss, But I would also say strategist
and polsters miss. And that is a sense of place
and how that impacts how people vote. Most Americans, eight
(21:50):
out of ten live within fifty miles of where they
grew up. They have a profound connection to place. It
is a context and a meaningfulness that is very, very
missed by strategists, posters, some Republicans in all Democrats and
(22:11):
the news media because people tend to vote place and
their connection to place as opposed to the way people
that are the placelest. So what do I mean by that?
So the place lists are people that live in places
like DC or New York and not saying they're bad
or worse, but they don't know anyone that is tied
(22:35):
to their community that believes that there is more value
in being able to have Sunday Supper with their grandparents
than their grandchildren and their parents. And people they went
to grade school in high school with then getting an
extra bonus or a new car every year. That's their power.
(22:55):
Their power is experiencing the same things that their grandparents did,
but also being able to pass that legacy onto their
children and grandchildren. And people that live in DC and
New York tend to not know people that value that,
so they don't know how to cover it. And Donald
(23:15):
Trump has always had a very good understanding of place
and placelessness. Are cultural curators? What do we mean by that?
The people that curate what we see on television, what
we see in Hollywood, what we see in government institutions, academia.
They're highly concentrated in these super zip codes in this
(23:37):
country and newsrooms, and they don't know and understand what
drives your average voter. That's how they missed that Black voters,
Hispanic voters, Asian voters voted together because they're voting for
the betterment or their family and their community and that
continuity as opposed to voting for the next social justice issue. Right,
(24:01):
that's that detachment that the Democrats have experienced, that President
Trump has recognized is a currency for these voters.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
I think that's exactly right.
Speaker 1 (24:12):
And I think your understanding of that, which I picked
up on I think as early as twenty fifteen, you
just got the rhythm and you understood it. But now
I'm gonna ask you a totally off the wall question.
Young person walks in and says to you, I'm thinking
about becoming a journalist.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
What would you tell them.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Work for a local newspaper, cover the water authority, cover
the school board, get the cops, reporter beats, cover the
things that really matter to people. Don't jump from college
to Washington, DC, because you will not have the ability
(24:52):
to understand people. You will not been sat at a
school board meeting and understand what really drives people votes,
What really drives people's sentiments, what places them either as
a Republican or Democrat to cause decisions made by local politics.
It is an unsexy, unglamorous way to hone your craft.
(25:19):
And you're not going to be on TV. Being on TV,
it shouldn't be your driving force. You should learn from
the very bottom. If you want to be a good journalist.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Is it a fulfilling profession?
Speaker 3 (25:32):
Yeah? Absolutely. I mean I think anybody that reads me
or is listening to others podcasts knows that I am
so grateful and so honored. People open up their door
at their house to me to let me stand on
the soccer fields and talk to them. Let me go
(25:53):
to their covered dish dinners and the Lutheran charges, bowling alleys, diners,
small businesses, let me go in a coal mine. It
is an honor to tell their stories. That's my job.
That's the joy I get.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
There's sort of I don't overdo it, but in the way,
you're kind of a poet of the American experience. You
pick up the language, you pick up the rhythm, you
sense those unique intersections that make us an amazing country.
You're a great, great tribute to the professional.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
That is such an honor to hear you say that
the book is number one on the New York Times
bestseller list. And it's not because of me, it's because
of all those people. That's also President Trump opening up
with me in a very raw, very emotional way, not
just on the next day, throughout the campaign and even today,
(26:45):
allowing me to be able to tell his story as
much as I'm allowed to tell the American people's story.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Well, you're amazing. I want to thank you.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
I regard you as a friend, not just as a
colleague in the business of self government.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I want to thank you for joining me your.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
New book book Butler, The Untold Story of the near
assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America's Hardland.
It's available now on Amazon and in bookstores everywhere. I
encourage everyone to get a copy. And I have to tystling.
I'm so thrilled that you would take this amount of
time and talk with me.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Absolutely, it was an honor to be with you.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Thank you to my guests, Selena Zito.
Speaker 1 (27:25):
You can get a link to buy her new book, Butler,
on our show page at newsworld dot com. Newsworld is
produced by Gaingrish three sixty and iHeartMedia. Our executive producer
is Guarnsey Sloan. Our researcher is Rachel Peterson. The artwork
for the show was created by Steve Penley. Special thanks
to the team at Gingrishtree sixty. If you've been enjoying Newtsworld,
(27:47):
I hope you'll go to up a podcast and both
rate us with five stars and give us a review
so others can learn what it's all about. Right now,
listeners of Newsworld can sign up for my three three
weekly columns, I Gangwish three sixty dot com slash newsletter.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
I'm new Ganglish. This is newts Work.
On this episode of News World one year ago. On
July thirteenth, twenty twenty four, Donald J. Trump, then a
former president of the United States and presumptive nominee of
the Republican Party in the twenty twenty four presidential election,
survived an assassination attempt while speaking at an open air
campaign rally near Butler, Pennsylvania. There are moments that define America.
(00:28):
The late afternoon hours of July thirteenth, twenty twenty four
was one of them.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
In her new book Butler, The Untold.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Story of the near Assassination of Donald Trump and the
Fight for America's Heartland, Selina Zeito writes a narrative of
that fateful day and describes the people of the Heartland
and the untold story of how the President found his
way back into the heart of the electorate. I have
to say in welcoming my guest, I've regard her as
(00:57):
one of the finest reporters in the country, somebody with
unusual knowledge, and as she and I were chatting, somebody
whose family goes back to the very beginning of Butler,
and so her ties to that region are amazing. But
on anything, she writes, I personally recommend Selena Zito as
a remarkable reporter and a great analyst.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Selena, welcome and thank you for joining me on New World.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Oh my goodness, thank you so much. It's such an
automist speaker. I really appreciate you taking time to do this.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
You know, it's sort of amazing. I didn't realize till
later that you were only a few feet from President
Trump when the shots rang out.
Speaker 2 (01:44):
I mean, what was that like?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Well, in that moment, people often say when they are
in a tragic situation or they're in a perilous situation,
the time slows down, and that was also the case
for me, and I remember thinking everything is happening in layers.
That's what it felt like. That's the only way I
can describe it. When I saw him again, I'm just
(02:09):
a few feet away. I had just seen him six
minutes earlier in what's called the click area, which is
behind the stage. It's a curtained off area. It's a
place where the President shakes hands, gives a lot of
hogs to state troopers, paramedics, firemen, right the people that
serve the community. And I was supposed to fly to
(02:31):
Bedminster with him along with my daughter to do an
interview with him about Pennsylvania, and he just wanted to
say hi. Well, because we were backstage and I can
hear the Lee Greenwood music starting up, they made my
daughter and myself just go in the buffer. The buffer
is the area that surrounds the stage, so that's why
(02:55):
we were just feet away. In fact, if you look
at the covered Butler took that photo and it have
a lot of significance to it. There's a reason I
chose one that didn't have his face. I chose one
that showed him looking at the people there and them
looking back at him. And that's really at the heart
(03:15):
of the entire journey of this book, not just that moment,
but the rest of the campaign and what happens going forward.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
I have to ask, how old is your daughter?
Speaker 3 (03:26):
Thirty eight?
Speaker 2 (03:27):
Oh, this must have been there. She was a mom
at the center of history.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yeah, she's a photo journalist. We do a lot of
work together. She's also the mother of my four grandchildren.
So we follow him out. She's taking the photos. I'm
doing video just with my phone. People look at my
Twitter account that day they can see that. And then
we make our way off to the side of the podium,
and he does two things that he never does. A
(03:56):
chart comes down, and I remember turning to my daughter
and saying, you will totally get this. I mean, what
does he think he is ross pro? Why does he
have this chart? If he ever has a chart, the
chart is on the other side, and it's at the end.
But that is also a very rare occurrence. And then
(04:17):
he turns his neck away from the people at the rally.
Why is that significant? If you've ever watched in great
detail to a Trump rally on television, or you've ever
attended one, the relationship between him and the people attending
is very transactional. They feed off of him, he feeds
(04:37):
off of them, and they all show respect to each
other by never turning away from each other. And he
turns to his neck away from the rally. It's in
those moments that four pops go right over my head.
I know immediately it's gun shots a gun owner. And
I remember in the moment watching him grow I have
(05:00):
his ear, seeing the blood and seeing the Secret Service
rush him right in a protective stance. I remember thinking
I have purpose here. I am a journalist. God gave
me a gift, and I'm a witness to history, and
I need to be on top of my game. I'm
never thinking I'd be writing a book about it, but
(05:21):
knowing that I had to chronicle it as a journalist
and be responsible. So I stood there. I didn't get down,
and as the Secret Service are surrounding him, the second
round of gunfire goes over our heads. But he is
now protected. I mean, they're putting their life in front
of him at this moment, and I am watching him
(05:47):
kneel down on his own, So I calculate, Okay, in
this moment, I at least know that he is not
gravely hit. I see the blood, but I know that
he was able to get down on his own. He
didn't get knocked down, he didn't fall down, he didn't collapse.
After the second round goes out. Michelle Picard the third
(06:09):
he was the President's campaign advance man for the event.
He just takes me down and lays on top of
me in a protective stance. In doing that, I'm just
in this unique position where I can see the President's
face through the feet of the Secret Service. I can
(06:31):
see him moving, I can see him talking. I can
hear him talking. I have my recorder on, so I
also have it, and I have my recorder on, because
when I go to a Trump rally, oftentimes I find
them to be covered without nuance, without context, and so
his words are used flatly as opposed to missing the
(06:53):
nuance of when he says it. Missing the cadence was
when he says something, and so I always recorded any ways,
and I hear them talking, I understand the shooter is down.
That's when Michelle Leicard finally gets off of me. That
is when I hear him talking about his shoes, which
(07:15):
I can laugh about now, but it's kind of funny.
He's insistent that he gets his shoes on. Why are
his shoes off? When they surrounded him, they knocked his
shoes off. The crowds start shouting USA, he mouths it,
I can't hear his voice. Project. He gets up on
his own and he still surrounded and they want to
(07:36):
take him off stage, and he goes, wait, wait, wait,
He turns around and says, fight, fight, fight. Now you
have to think about that moment. People wonder, why do
you do that? Well, you'll find out in the book
the next day and we can talk about it why
he did actually do it. But you also, if you're
watching the video of it, the crowd's comportment completely changes,
(08:01):
and there is a calmness there you would not likely
expect when you see a president's shop before your eyes
in front of fifty thousand people. But the way that
the people comported themselves, the way that they exited, is
something that is very underreported and very powerful. And even
(08:22):
in the hours afterwards, they didn't let us go for
two hours. The parking lot. If there's fifty thousand people there,
there's at least fifteen to twenty thousand cars, right, maybe
people goes and twos or threes, whatever. And so they're
out there in that big old farm field, and you
(08:45):
were born in Pennsylvania, you know exactly what that Abalachian
farmfield is like. They're out there, hugging each other, giving
each other water, people at coolers were sharing food, they
were singing. It was all very very beautiful moment, which
is why I take issue with an interview that was
(09:06):
done the other day with Chuck Dodd where he was
saying a reporter who covered it said he had PTSD
from this crowd. I don't know what crowd he was seeing,
but it certainly wasn't the crowd that attended that event.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
I think that's a crazy comment.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
I have other words, but this is a family say them.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
So. At that moment, though, you're seeing the president walk
off and what I think is one of the most
iconic moments in American campaign history. I went that night
on Hannadhim talked about the notion that this was a
providential event because if he turned one second later, he'd.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Have been dead.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
His courage and his self awareness in immediately coming back
and chanting fight, fight, fight with a raised fist. That
was astonishing. What was your reaction in real time as
you were the.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Nothing surprised me in that moment, like in the way
he handled that nothing. People will find out in the
book many details that they don't know about that. He
called me the next morning, bright and early, and he
calls me and says, Selena, this is President Donald Trump.
Almost like laughed because like, of course you are President
(10:24):
Donald Trump, right, who doesn't know that voice? But before
I could even say a word, he said, I want
to make sure that you and your daughter are okay.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:34):
And I really apologize for not being able to do
that interview with you.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
And I store like a truck driver and said, are
you bleeping kidding me? Sir, you've just been shot. I'm
not worried about an interview. He would go on to
call me seven times that day.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
We had some very very profound discussions, just two people talking,
trying to figure out what happened, why it happened, why
he did what he did, God and faith and purpose.
I suppose if I were a better reporter, I would
oppressed him. I could tell he was going through something
(11:16):
and he needed to talk to someone who was there,
not family members. Family members aren't going to understand this
because they love him, but they weren't there. And he
and I have mutual respect for each other because of
the way he treats the people in the middle of
the country, and he knows me. I've interviewed him dozens
of times. I led him because I needed it too,
(11:40):
to just figure things out. I wasn't supposed to be
where he was either, right, I was supposed to interview
him earlier than day. I wasn't supposed to be standing
a few feet away from him. The conversations centered on purpose,
on faith, on God, on what his obligation is. Because
he was spared, and the last thing we talked about.
(12:04):
I asked him, I said, I gotta ask you, Sarah,
why'd you say fight, fight, fight? And he said, you know, Selena.
To be honest, I wasn't Donald Trump in that moment.
I was representing everything about the country and the presidency,
and I had an obligation to show strength and that
(12:26):
we will endure and that we will go on and
nothing will take us down. And I needed to represent
that grit, that American exceptionalism because I knew if I didn't,
it could have dire consequences for the people that are there,
but also people in the country. I needed to project
(12:48):
that strength, and that's why I did it.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
I talked with Speaker Johnson, who happened to be Admiral
Largo when the second shooter was discovered at the golf course,
and he was there when they came in to tell
him that there was a second potential shooter, and Mike
told me that they went off to a private room
and they prayed for about two hours. Don't you think
(13:30):
this was a transformative event for Trump himself?
Speaker 3 (13:34):
I have seen it in him every day and people
will say, well, he's this, well, he's that, and I
will argue that there is a profound difference in him
in the way that he has conducted his presidency in
terms of understanding that every single second of every day
(13:54):
counts and he has to get things done to preserve
the country and to make the country strong. But I've
also seen moments of faith that a lot of people
don't see. On Wednesday, I mean Pittsburgh, we have this
extraordinary energy conference and I'm set to interview the President.
(14:16):
While first before then it ends up happening to be after.
I think he and I have this thing that it
happens like that, right, And we're doing the interview, and
I'm with the photographer. I'm not going to use his
name protect his privacy, but I went with the photographer
that I use almost all the time outside of my
daughter to photograph the president. What would do the interview.
He's a very good photographer and President knows him as well.
(14:41):
Before the interview, the photographer tells me that his father
has been diagnosed with a terminal illness and his father
loves President Trump. And I have a copy of my
book with me, so at the end of the interview,
I said, it's the President. I need to ask you
a favor. Hees, Zito, you never asked me a favor,
and I said, I know, sir, but my photographer, who
(15:03):
you know very well, his father had received some bad
health news and he's a really really big fan of yours,
and I suspect that this would lift his spirits if
you sign my book. President takes his kind of course,
I'll sign your book. And as he signs the book,
he looks up at the photographer and you could tell
that the photographer is very emotionally reacted to this, and
(15:26):
he said, look, get that video thing rolling. I'll do
you one better, and he does this beautiful moment, a
video message to the photographer's father, and the first thing
he says is you have a good boy. Now what
father doesn't want to hear that about their son. Your
(15:48):
son worked hard. I see him working hard all the time.
That alone was profound because that's a father talking to
another father. And then he says God works in ways
we don't and always understand, so have faith. And I
look forward to meeting you. And I looked up and
(16:08):
you've been in those clique rooms, right, it's mostly staff
and secret service. And there was not a dry eye
in that room. And so when people ask me about
faith and God and the President, and they are very
skeptical of it, I always remind them that your belief
in a higher power, your belief in God, doesn't mean
(16:30):
you have to go around and shout it. Sometimes for
people it's very very private, but it is always profound
and meaningful.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
I want to take you back.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
In my limited experiences with President Trump, I've shared almost
one hundred percent of what you have said about him,
in the ways he's not understood by.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
The elite media.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
I want to take you right back to Butler. I mean,
you're an eyewitness to history. I've never seen this Secret
Service look more incompetent than they did in that whole
experience with this guy who apparently wanders in with a
rangefinder then wanders back in later. The whole notion that
(17:13):
they didn't cover the roof because it was too sloped,
the excuses just strike me as being almost something from
a comedy movie.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
I mean, we had congressmen days afterwards climbing up on
that sloped roof who are not spring chickens. Our men
and women in the field are very fit people. Right,
There's several things that went wrong First of all, there
is this archaic role in the Secret Service that former
(17:43):
presidents and or candidates do not get the same amount
of protection that the current president has. Now, that's kind
of silly. Donald Trump at that time was very different
than Jimmy Carter right, or Bill Clinton, or George W.
(18:03):
Bush or Barack Obama. He's in the middle of a campaign,
he is the presumptive nominee. We're in a polarizing world,
and he's getting essentially the same kind of protective stance
that any other former president would get. Well, they're not
doing rallies. And well, Barack Obama every once in a
while will do a rally, but they're not doing rallies.
(18:26):
We are in a very polarizing time. There are times
when leadership needs to make decisions that go outside of
rules that don't meet the moment. The other problem is
there was no communication between local law enforcement and the
Secret Service. Now, you and I both know that a
(18:50):
local law enforcement member man or woman, they know their
hometown and all the nooks and cranny and all the
places where all the vulnerabilities, more so than even the
most studied agent who would possibly miss something that's a
(19:10):
potential threat. I remember pulling up to the event, and
when you're a journalist, you've got to be there so early.
And I remember pulling up and looking up at the
water tower. I didn't look just up, but I also
looked down to see if someone was just protecting the
access to the water tower. Because the water tower, which
(19:34):
sort of loomed not that far away over the farm
field the ladder to go up, you couldn't see that
from the vantage point. So I remember thinking, they'll get
to that later. I mean, someone either needs to be
at the bottom or someone needs to be up there,
because this is a big vulnerability. And I didn't think
(19:55):
about it again. But there's so many outcroppings of trees
that's rounded this farmfield. There's so many outbuildings, right this
is a farm show where people show things livestock in
different buildings, and they're peppered all across the place, and
there were a lot of them that weren't covered, including
the one that Thomas Matthew Crooks climbed on top of.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Do you think that was just a bureaucratic error.
Speaker 3 (20:20):
I think it had a lot to do with leadership decisions.
I struggled to think of the men and women who
were in the field that day, not the decision makers,
but the guys who do the field work. I struggled
to believe that they made that decision.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Who are without Adele, the most astute and insightful student
of sort of Middle American relations to Donald Trump?
Speaker 2 (21:04):
And you caught this rhythm, I.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
Think, very early for his entire career, all the years
we've now known him. And you describe at one point
this trip you took with him a couple of weeks
before Butler, where he's just wandering around small towns. I
have a sense that, probably more than any other reporter
in the country, you have a sense of the rhythm
of what's behind all this.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Yes, so a lot of the theme throughout the book,
and it's a theme the journalists that live in DC
or New York miss, But I would also say strategist
and polsters miss. And that is a sense of place
and how that impacts how people vote. Most Americans, eight
(21:50):
out of ten live within fifty miles of where they
grew up. They have a profound connection to place. It
is a context and a meaningfulness that is very, very
missed by strategists, posters, some Republicans in all Democrats and
(22:11):
the news media because people tend to vote place and
their connection to place as opposed to the way people
that are the placelest. So what do I mean by that?
So the place lists are people that live in places
like DC or New York and not saying they're bad
or worse, but they don't know anyone that is tied
(22:35):
to their community that believes that there is more value
in being able to have Sunday Supper with their grandparents
than their grandchildren and their parents. And people they went
to grade school in high school with then getting an
extra bonus or a new car every year. That's their power.
(22:55):
Their power is experiencing the same things that their grandparents did,
but also being able to pass that legacy onto their
children and grandchildren. And people that live in DC and
New York tend to not know people that value that,
so they don't know how to cover it. And Donald
(23:15):
Trump has always had a very good understanding of place
and placelessness. Are cultural curators? What do we mean by that?
The people that curate what we see on television, what
we see in Hollywood, what we see in government institutions, academia.
They're highly concentrated in these super zip codes in this
(23:37):
country and newsrooms, and they don't know and understand what
drives your average voter. That's how they missed that Black voters,
Hispanic voters, Asian voters voted together because they're voting for
the betterment or their family and their community and that
continuity as opposed to voting for the next social justice issue. Right,
(24:01):
that's that detachment that the Democrats have experienced, that President
Trump has recognized is a currency for these voters.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
I think that's exactly right.
Speaker 1 (24:12):
And I think your understanding of that, which I picked
up on I think as early as twenty fifteen, you
just got the rhythm and you understood it. But now
I'm gonna ask you a totally off the wall question.
Young person walks in and says to you, I'm thinking
about becoming a journalist.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
What would you tell them.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
Work for a local newspaper, cover the water authority, cover
the school board, get the cops, reporter beats, cover the
things that really matter to people. Don't jump from college
to Washington, DC, because you will not have the ability
(24:52):
to understand people. You will not been sat at a
school board meeting and understand what really drives people votes,
What really drives people's sentiments, what places them either as
a Republican or Democrat to cause decisions made by local politics.
It is an unsexy, unglamorous way to hone your craft.
(25:19):
And you're not going to be on TV. Being on TV,
it shouldn't be your driving force. You should learn from
the very bottom. If you want to be a good journalist.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Is it a fulfilling profession?
Speaker 3 (25:32):
Yeah? Absolutely. I mean I think anybody that reads me
or is listening to others podcasts knows that I am
so grateful and so honored. People open up their door
at their house to me to let me stand on
the soccer fields and talk to them. Let me go
(25:53):
to their covered dish dinners and the Lutheran charges, bowling alleys, diners,
small businesses, let me go in a coal mine. It
is an honor to tell their stories. That's my job.
That's the joy I get.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
There's sort of I don't overdo it, but in the way,
you're kind of a poet of the American experience. You
pick up the language, you pick up the rhythm, you
sense those unique intersections that make us an amazing country.
You're a great, great tribute to the professional.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
That is such an honor to hear you say that
the book is number one on the New York Times
bestseller list. And it's not because of me, it's because
of all those people. That's also President Trump opening up
with me in a very raw, very emotional way, not
just on the next day, throughout the campaign and even today,
(26:45):
allowing me to be able to tell his story as
much as I'm allowed to tell the American people's story.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Well, you're amazing. I want to thank you.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
I regard you as a friend, not just as a
colleague in the business of self government.
Speaker 2 (26:57):
I want to thank you for joining me your.
Speaker 1 (26:59):
New book book Butler, The Untold Story of the near
assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America's Hardland.
It's available now on Amazon and in bookstores everywhere. I
encourage everyone to get a copy. And I have to tystling.
I'm so thrilled that you would take this amount of
time and talk with me.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Absolutely, it was an honor to be with you.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Thank you to my guests, Selena Zito.
Speaker 1 (27:25):
You can get a link to buy her new book, Butler,
on our show page at newsworld dot com. Newsworld is
produced by Gaingrish three sixty and iHeartMedia. Our executive producer
is Guarnsey Sloan. Our researcher is Rachel Peterson. The artwork
for the show was created by Steve Penley. Special thanks
to the team at Gingrishtree sixty. If you've been enjoying Newtsworld,
(27:47):
I hope you'll go to up a podcast and both
rate us with five stars and give us a review
so others can learn what it's all about. Right now,
listeners of Newsworld can sign up for my three three
weekly columns, I Gangwish three sixty dot com slash newsletter.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
I'm new Ganglish. This is newts Work.
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.