From a hospital bed, fresh off surviving an assassination attempt, Donald Trump was handed a photo. Bloodied, fist raised, an American flag behind him—an image that would instantly define a moment in US history. His reaction?
“Wow, that’s iconic,” Trump reportedly said. “That’s the most American picture I’ve ever seen.”
The aftermath of the attack
According to an excerpt from Revenge, a new book by Axios reporter Alex Isenstadt, moments before, chaos had erupted at Trump’s Butler, Pennsylvania rally. Secret Service agents tackled him as gunfire rang out. In the aftermath, Trump, dazed but defiant, pumped his fist and declared, “Fight, fight, fight,” before being whisked into an SUV.
At the hospital, doctors ordered a CT scan to check for a concussion. The results were clear—but Trump had another request.
“Can you give me a copy of these?” he asked a nurse. “Because I want to make sure I can show reporters that my cognitive function is 100 percent. You can’t say the same about Joe Biden.”
A defining image
As President Biden addressed the nation, Trump, unable to watch on TV, followed along on his aide’s phone. Then came the photos. One showed a bullet narrowly missing his head. Another, taken by AP’s Evan Vucci, captured Trump, bloodied but unbowed, raising his fist.
The behind-the-scenes chaos of that day is laid bare in Alex Isenstadt’s book Revenge, which details the frantic moments after the shooting, the scramble to control the narrative, and how Trump processed the event as both a personal ordeal and a political opportunity. The book offers gripping insider accounts of the security response, the media frenzy, and the power struggle to shape history in real-time.
Before being discharged, Trump retrieved his torn and bloodstained clothing. “This is going into the museum,” he said.
Investigators quickly identified the shooter as Thomas Matthews Crooks, a 20-year-old from Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. The full motives remain under scrutiny, but the image of Trump, fist raised in defiance, is already cemented in history—just as he wanted it to be.
