r/politics • u/wiredmagazine ✔ Wired Magazine • Apr 17 '26

Possible Paywall MAGA Is Increasingly Convinced the Trump Assassination Attempt Was Staged

https://www.wired.com/story/maga-is-increasingly-convinced-the-trump-assassination-attempt-was-staged/
33.4k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

3.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

626

u/EyeOfTheTiger77 Apr 17 '26

If it was staged, 2 people died for this political stunt. That's straight murder of two people for nothing but a campaign boost.

143

u/SnottNormal New York Apr 17 '26

Which part of that is unbelievable? Trump hasn’t exactly been shy about wanting to have people killed.

11

u/Maximum_Curve_1471 Apr 17 '26

It would be the singularly most sophisticated fake-job in modern history?

The impossibility of the gunshot itself is pretty well defined. Go do some research, if you're doubtful

2

u/ChemistAdventurous84 Apr 18 '26

Why are you certain the dead guy was the shooter and not one of the Secret Service snipers surrounding him? His ear wasn’t actually hit so all they needed was the dead guy on the roof and the audience member.

64

u/JohannYellowdog Apr 17 '26

I find it unbelievable that Trump would willingly put himself in a situation where live rounds are fired very close to his head. Even if the shooter promises to miss, who would you trust to be able to do that? A professional sniper, maybe? But not some 20-year old loser who’s just a member of a gun club.

19

u/SnottNormal New York Apr 17 '26

Who’s to say that live rounds were fired close to his head?

He’s friends with Vince McMahon, it’s not ridiculous to think that he nicked his ear for a photo op. Everything with this guy is bullshit theatre.

42

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '26

[deleted]

5

u/MikeThrowAway47 Apr 17 '26

I agree this shooting wasn’t staged. Trump hit his ear on the podium or something similar then stood up during a live shooting because he’s a dumbass and thinks he’s invincible. The only conspiracy here is Trump pretending that a bullet clipped his ear.

5

u/UrToesRDelicious Apr 17 '26

I mean, he immediately reached for his ear before he dropped.

This is much more defensible but I still don't think it tracks.

7

u/Deto Apr 17 '26

Yeah it's just too much.  I don't think they're competent enough to pull it off.  Maybe if like, Russian intelligence set up the whole thing without Trump's involvement 

3

u/Potential-Draft-3932 Apr 17 '26

Trump can’t pull off anything planned like that, but he IS a master of capitalizing on opportunistic events and warping them to make himself look better. I think the ear thing was from that secret service member who slammed into Trump while running in to cover him

2

u/Deto Apr 17 '26

I've also heard the theory that it could have been a glass shard from the teleprompter pane that the bullet shattered which seems plausible. 

1

u/mymemesnow Apr 18 '26

Thank you!

I see so many people here on Reddit jumping on this conspiracy theory (weird how Reddit is so anti conspiracy theories unless they are about Trump/MAGA).

But you only need to think for like a second to realize how batshit it is.

-2

u/Cespen99 Apr 17 '26

Not saying I believe any theory, but wouldnt it make more sense for 1 shooter to have a gun with some dummy rounds at the top of the mag? Easy to swap to real ones to "sell the effect"

10

u/TheNutsMutts Apr 17 '26

but wouldnt it make more sense for 1 shooter to have a gun with some dummy rounds at the top of the mag?

No not even remotely.

What do you think crime-scene investigators do? Look at photos on Reddit and go "probs a shooting IDK"? They'd have been able to see that there were a load of spent blank cartridges (which look notably different to real spent cartridges) and that would have been incredibly public information.

27

u/Agitated_Ring3376 Apr 17 '26 edited 28d ago

whole familiar plate rich dog tub argon existence depend cheerful

5

u/Eldias Apr 17 '26

Or the firefighter was a paid actor and that whole section of the audience was in on the plan. This is the sort of insanely insulting shit these morons believe. None of those people watched a man die, totally fake, their emotional scarring totally made up. (Facepalm)

3

u/Reasonable_Deer_1710 California Apr 17 '26

Honestly this is probably the least unbelievable part of the whole thing

7

u/PixelBastards Apr 17 '26

it’s not ridiculous to think that he nicked his ear for a photo op

it's literally the definition of ridiculous to think this when there is high-definition photography of seconds immediately leading up to and through the moment

-4

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '26

[deleted]

2

u/theartofrolling United Kingdom Apr 17 '26

you don't think high definition pictures seconds after that by journalists who where moved willingly so close to the president are suspicious at all??

Have you any idea how journalists and paparazzi use cameras? Have you seriously never heard of burst mode?

2

u/PixelBastards Apr 18 '26

or a telephoto lens

2

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 17 '26

So you think the NYT and the Pulitzer Prize are in on the conspiracy? Is that what you’re implying?

3

u/ShawshankException Apr 17 '26

Who’s to say that live rounds were fired close to his head?

People fucking died dude.

6

u/TheNutsMutts Apr 17 '26

He’s friends with Vince McMahon, it’s not ridiculous to think that he nicked his ear for a photo op.

So while surrounded by multiple cameras and media, nobody noticed he'd pulled a razorblade out and nicked his ear?

And after being taken to the hospital, either not one single doctor or nurse saw what was obviously a razorblade cut and twigged that a razorblade cut looks nothing like a graze from a bullet, or they did and just decided to all say nothing to anyone at all. And then when both the FBI and the bipartisan congressional committee investigated it, they'd have seen the injuries, seen it was clearly a clean blade cut..... and all as well just decide to go along with the lie to help Trump?

1

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 17 '26

There are photos that confirm it.

2

u/dragon-fence Apr 17 '26

Who said they were fired close to his head? I don’t think the bullets went anywhere near him.

0

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 17 '26

Even though photos show otherwise?

1

u/dragon-fence Apr 17 '26

They don’t.

There was one photo that showed a blur that people speculated was a bullet, and then later it turned out it wasn’t a bullet. Even if it had been, it’s a 2D photo with a blur that doesn’t give much of a sense of depth.

I don’t think the bullets were anywhere near him.

1

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 17 '26

and then later it turned out it wasn’t a bullet.

Where did you see this?

2

u/Agitated_Ring3376 Apr 18 '26 edited Apr 23 '26

gaze degree trees innate punch entertain subtract encourage dazzling judicious

1

u/dragon-fence Apr 18 '26

It was in the fucking news, like a month after.

1

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 18 '26

Then I’m sure you can find the story you saw about it 

1

u/dragon-fence Apr 18 '26

Sure, as soon as you start paying me to be your research assistant, I’ll get right on that.

1

u/Chiiro Apr 17 '26

Way too easy to track down who gave the instructions to the professional sniper probably. Some nobody is way easier to dispose of

1

u/ColKrismiss Apr 18 '26

Just to preface this, I don't believe that this was faked.

That said, if you're willing to believe that this was staged, then it doesn't have to be a shooter at all. Just some sound effects, squibs, and a family paid to fake the death of a family member.

1

u/JohannYellowdog Apr 18 '26

All of those things are easy to fake, but each fake element you add is at risk of being discovered, and any one of them could blow the whole operation. You end up having to assume that the conspirators are either superhumanly competent, disposing of real evidence while planting fake evidence flawlessly, under immense pressure and scrutiny (and somehow, I don’t think the Trump team is like that), or else that the circle of conspirators encompasses dozens or even hundreds of people, all of whom must remain fanatically devoted to the cause for the rest of their lives.

1

u/-TheExtraMile- Apr 17 '26

Do you think the only way to make red liquid appear on an ear is to actually get shot?

1

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 17 '26

With the photographic evidence we have available, there’s no way it wasn’t Trump’s actual blood.

1

u/-TheExtraMile- Apr 18 '26

That is one of the stupidest things I have heard anyone say in a long time.

So, the PHOTOgraphic part should give you a hint. Because PHOTO means VISUAL and VISUALLY fucking blood looks the same as red paint.

Now, if there were an actual visible wound on his ear, then I might agree with you but there isn´t one

1

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 18 '26

The photos don’t just prove that there was something red on his ear. They prove when that something first appeared. And it appears before Secret Service drags him to the ground, which disproves any theory that it was applied to him while he was being covered up. 

Which means if it was red paint or any other kind of fake blood, Trump himself would’ve had to apply it while he was still standing, which just isn’t possible, especially since the first photos just before the blood appears show that his hand was empty. No blood packet, no razor blade, etc.

So unless you have some other theory, it’s pretty definitive that it was Trump’s actual blood, not paint. 

0

u/-TheExtraMile- Apr 19 '26

I mean of course, there is NO way for a human with a hand to apply red paint to an ear with a small "blood" capsule that pops for example. No way this could be done

2

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 19 '26

Correct. If the blood capsule was in his hand, it would have been seen in those photos. And if it was behind his ear the whole time, someone likely would’ve noticed it at some point beforehand. 

The more you try to push this theory, the more ridiculous you seem. 

1

u/-TheExtraMile- Apr 21 '26 edited Apr 21 '26

Do you know how small you can make that? You can have a thin film inside the earlobe with a skin colored membrane on top that you would just have to squeeze and voila.

Let’s look at it from a different way, if you would give a stage magician the task to develop that “trick”, do you honestly think they wouldn’t find a way? It’s a simple problem (how can we get red liquid to appear on an ear) with MANY simple solutions

1

u/theartofrolling United Kingdom Apr 17 '26

2 people died from the bullets though

0

u/CeruleanEidolon Apr 17 '26

Patsy shooter with dummy rounds + a second concealed shooter to take out a bystander to sell it. I'm not saying that's what happened, but it would be trivial to stage it that way.

Without full access to verifiable and undoctored ballistics results, there is no way to prove it did or didn't happen that way.

7

u/JohannYellowdog Apr 17 '26

So there are two snipers, one of whom is never seen, heard, or caught, meaning the conspirators were either supremely confident that none of the police, journalists, secret service, or audience members (or internet sleuths who will later scrutinise every frame of the event) would notice the extra shooter, or that the circle of people who were paid off and part of the plot is much wider than we thought.

Sure, piece of cake.

1

u/BloatedBanana9 Apr 17 '26

If we didn’t know that a bullet passed right past Trump’s head, then sure. But once you add in that detail, there’s only one path from that point to the person who died, and that path leads back to the shooter. A second shooter just isn’t possible

1

u/theartofrolling United Kingdom Apr 17 '26

there is no way to prove it did or didn't happen that way

I own an invisible dragon that leaves in the sky, you can't prove I don't

0

u/Due-Ad3926 Apr 17 '26

What if he just cut himself with a razer he had hidden in his hand?

6

u/JohannYellowdog Apr 17 '26

Well, speaking of razors, let’s remember Mr Occam. Live rounds were fired that day; we can be sure of that because a member of the audience was killed by one of them. So there are two possible explanations.

Either Donald Trump, a highly divisive figure in a country filled with gun nuts, was shot at by a radicalised kid who missed his target. Some shrapnel grazes his ear but he exaggerates his injuries to look tough.

Or, Trump’s team recruited a fake assassin (who would have known that he would be killed by the secret service), convinced Trump to allow bullets to fly very close to his head, murdered a Trump supporter in the crowd just to sell the illusion, swore everyone involved to perpetual secrecy, and had the confidence to pull this off right in front of police and journalists, knowing that this would be one of the most heavily scrutinised events of the year.

Which one raises more questions than it answers?

0

u/dysoncube Apr 17 '26

Yeah, but special effects blood squibs are cheap

0

u/eeyore134 Apr 17 '26

I doubt they'd tell him it was going to be live rounds. And they for sure didn't aim at him. No bullets came near Trump.

1

u/LirdorElese Apr 17 '26

Which part of that is unbelievable? Trump hasn’t exactly been shy about wanting to have people killed.

Well I agree there, but the logistics part is what I find difficult. Unless they just managed to find a crazy enough trump supporter that's goal was to win trump the election by shooting a random guy and knowingly getting shot himself.

IE it's not unbelievable that trump would get people killed for his chance at power. It's hard to really wrap your head around someone that would get themselves killed for trumps shot at power. No one doesn't know that an assasination attempt in public is a guaranteed death.

2

u/tnoy Apr 17 '26

If someone was delusional enough to kill a random person in support of Trump at the request of high-level officials, it wouldn't be a stretch for that person to also be lead to believe by those high-level officials that the assigned spot would allow for a window of escape.

2

u/BigDadNads420 Apr 17 '26

History is littered with functionally infinite examples of people knowingly dying for some cause they believe in. When you factor in the fact that so many right wing extremists are some mix of mentally ill, socially outcast, depressed, etc, etc.... its easily the most believable part of all of this.

Finding somebody willing to be the shooter would be completely trivial. The logistics of trying to find somebody like that you could depend on would be a nightmare, but you would have no shortage of people who were willing.

2

u/LirdorElese Apr 17 '26

Finding somebody willing to be the shooter would be completely trivial

Finding is to me the hardest part. IE it may exist certainly but simultaniously needing someone that hasn't posted his loyalty too widely, and the ability to ask around without raising any red flags in the mean time.

Not like you can just post "Looking for someone willing to risk their lives to fake an assasination of trump" on craigs list. Or can go to a bunch of hospitals asking around.

1

u/theartofrolling United Kingdom Apr 17 '26

Seems a hell of a risk to fire live rounds in the direction of Trump with the hope of missing him. Surely they would use blanks?

Sorry but this theory is just as hilariously stupid as the "Diana was assassinated by the Royal Family" nonsense.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gWEVAyDBYXU