‘No evidence’ Trump hit by shrapnel rather than bullet, former White House doctor says
There is “no evidence” that Donald Trump was hit with anything other than an assassin’s bullet at a rally earlier this month in Pennsylvania, according to his former White House physician.
“Based on my direct observations of the injury, my relevant clinical background, and my significant experience evaluating and treating patients with similar wounds, I completely concur with the initial assessment and treatment provided by the doctors and nurses at Butler Memorial Hospital on the day of the shooting,” congressman Ronny Jackson wrote on Friday in a letter posted on Truth Social, highlighting his past experience with similar wounds as a combat physician in the Navy.
The comments come two days after FBI director Christopher Wray suggested during testimony in Congress that Trump may have been hit by shrapnel, an analysis Jackson called “wrong and inappropriate.”
“There is absolutely no evidence that it was anything other than a bullet,” Jackson added.
During testimony Wednesday before the House Judiciary, Wray said the FBI had collected eight spent rounds from the site of the Pennsylvania rally and had accounted for each shot gunman Thomas Matthew Crooks fired at Trump.
“With respect to former president Trump, there’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that hit his ear,” the FBI said.
“As I sit here right now, I don’t know whether that bullet… in addition to causing the grazing, could have landed somewhere else.”
He added: “But I believe we’ve accounted for all the shots in the cartridges.”
Top Republican leaders, as well as Trump himself, have insisted the former president’s ear was wounded by a bullet at the rally.
“We’ve all seen the video, we’ve seen the analysis, we’ve heard it from multiple sources in different angles that a bullet went through his ear. I’m not sure it matters that much,” House Speaker Johnson told NBC News.
Trump has incorporated the shooting into his stump speech.
At a rally in Michigan, his first after the shooting, Trump claimed he “took a bullet for democracy.”
Others have praised Trump for standing up and pumping his fist after being shot.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg told Bloomberg that “seeing Donald Trump get up after getting shot in the face and pump his fist in the air with the American flag is one of the most badass things I’ve ever seen in my life.”