Washington:

Presidential candidate Donald Trump said Saturday he will return to holding outdoor rallies with additional Secret Service protection, two weeks after he was injured in an assassination attempt at an open-air campaign event.

“I will continue to do outdoor rallies, and the Secret Service has agreed to substantially step up their operation. They are very capable of doing so,” Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

“No one can ever be allowed to stop or impede free speech or gathering,” he added.

His remarks came after the Secret Service reportedly encouraged Trump’s campaign to stop scheduling outdoor campaign events following his assassination attempt, opting instead for large indoor arenas.

Trump was wounded when a 20-year-old gunman shot at him during an outdoor rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, killing one person and injuring two others.

The FBI confirmed on Friday that Trump was hit by a bullet, or a fragment of one — putting to rest questions over the nature of the injury to his right ear.

Investigators are still working to establish a motive for the attack, which marked another stunning chapter in the US election race and sparked heavy criticism of the Secret Service.

Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned on Tuesday after acknowledging that the agency had failed in its mission of protecting high-profile politicians.

She told a congressional committee that the Secret Service was alerted “two to five times” ahead of the attack about a “suspicious individual” at the rally, but was unable to locate him before he opened fire.

Perched on the roof of a nearby building, he was shot dead by a Secret Service sniper less than 30 seconds after firing the first of eight shots.

Trump has made the shooting a key part of his campaign pitch, telling supporters that he “took a bullet for democracy” and vowing to return to Butler for a “big and beautiful rally.”

On Saturday, the Republican and his running mate JD Vance were scheduled to hold a campaign event at an indoor, 6,000-seat hockey arena in the midwestern US state of Minnesota.

Meanwhile, Vice President Kamala Harris — who is on track to become the Democratic nominee — was set to attend a fundraising event in Pittsfield, Massachusetts.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman receives a warm welcome from BJP women workers on her arrival, at the party headquarters, in New Delhi on Tuesday.
| Photo Credit: ANI

Budget 2024: Nirmala Sitharaman signals shift from earlier trickle-down strategy to a slew of schemes

Presenting her seventh Union Budget and the first after this year’s Lok Sabha election, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on July 23 unveiled a flurry of measures aimed at fixing the woes of unemployed youth, small businesses, and the middle class, and sought to strengthen the ruling NDA coalition’s bonds with support for multiple investment projects in Bihar and Andhra Pradesh.

Budget 2024: States ruled by non-NDA parties ignored, says Opposition; four CMs to boycott Niti Aayog meet

The Opposition slammed the Union Budget calling it an exercise in political jugglery to appease the BJP’s two key allies, Janata Dal (United) and Telugu Desam Party, while doing little to address issues such as high rate of unemployment and inflation. States ruled by non-National Democratic Alliance (NDA) parties, the Opposition said, have been ignored.

Budget 2024: Stocks wobble on capital gain tax plan

The stock markets reacted negatively to the Budgetary provisions concerning additional tax burden on investors and closed in the negative territory led by losses in banking stocks after undergoing high volatility. The key benchmark indices recovered most of the lost ground in the second half of trading.

Trump assassination attempt: U.S. Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle steps down

The director of the U.S. Secret Service said on July 23 she is resigning following the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump that unleashed intensifying outcry about how the agency tasked with protecting current and former Presidents could fail in its core mission.

Y.S. Jagan approaches A.P. High Court seeking Leader of Opposition status 

Former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister and YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) president Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy filed a writ petition in the High Court (HC) praying for a direction to the A.P. government to designate him as the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Legislative Assembly, in accordance with Section 12-B of the A.P. Payment of Salaries and Pension and Removal Of Disqualifications Act, 1953.

NTA will release final NEET results within two days: Dharmendra Pradhan

Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on July 23 hailed the Supreme Court’s decision on the NEET-UG issue and announced that the final results of the medical entrance exam would be declared within two days. The merit list would be revised according to the observations made by the Supreme Court, he said.

Nehru Planetarium set for revamp, India’s space achievements to take centre stage

Nehru Planetarium is getting ready for a revamp by the year end, with its gallery set to feature by 2025 new interactive screens focusing on India’s latest space missions and developments in the field of astronomy. The planetarium has now teamed up with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to incorporate the country’s latest space missions into its shows.

Bombay High Court puts temporary hold on Indrani Mukerjea’s Europe trip 

The Bombay High Court on Tuesday passed an ad interim stay on a special court order that permitted Indrani Mukerjea to travel to Spain and United Kingdom until July 29. Ms. Mukerjea who is the prime accused in the alleged murder of her own daughter Sheena Bora, is currently out on bail.  

Sri Lanka apologises for forced cremations policy during pandemic 

Sri Lanka on Tuesday apologised for enforcing a “cremations only” policy during the Covid-19 pandemic, going against the religious sentiments of Muslims, as well as expert views that burials were safe. The government said the Cabinet approved a joint proposal from a group of ministers “to plead an apology on behalf of the government”, from all communities affected by the compulsory cremation policy during the pandemic, when President Gotabaya Rajapaksa was in office.

Paris Olympics preview | Indian pugilists capable of landing medal-winning punches

The presence of two World champions, including an Olympic medallist, and two Worlds medallists in the six-member Indian squad brightens up the country’s prospects in the Paris 2024 boxing ring. After the dismal performance of the male boxers in the initial qualifying phase and the loss of the women’s 57kg quota place due to Parveen Hooda’s missed dope tests, the boxing scene looked better as Amit Panghal (51kg) and Nishant Dev (71kg) notched up two quota places and Jaismine Lamboria reclaimed the 57kg slot.

Paris Olympics preview | Will the ‘nucleus of Indian sports’ live up to its title?

The health of Indian sports will largely depend on the contribution of Olympic medals by the shooters in the Paris Games. It may sound ironical that a sport that has brought nought from the last two Games in Rio and Tokyo, finds itself as the nucleus of Indian sports. There will be 21 shooters, the best from any country including China, competing for 27 medals. Can quality come from quantity? Can there be another gold medal from shooting, the way Abhinav Bindra won by asserting his mastery in air rifle in the Beijing Games in 2008.

Washington:

The US homeland security chief hit back Saturday at misogynistic attacks on the women Secret Service agents who threw themselves into the line of fire to protect Donald Trump from a would-be assassin.

“These assertions are baseless and insulting,” Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement after the some on the US political right accused the Secret Service of “woke” hiring practices they say nearly got the former president killed. 

He praised the “highly skilled and trained” women serving at every level of law enforcement across the country for risking “their lives on the front lines for the safety and security of others.”

“They are brave and selfless patriots who deserve our gratitude and respect,” he wrote.

The Department of Homeland Security will “with great pride, focus and devotion to mission, continue to recruit, retain and elevate women in our law enforcement ranks. Our Department will be the better for it, and our country more secure,” he continued.

In the week since a gunman opened fire during a Trump rally in Pennsylvania, killing one bystander, wounding two others and leaving the Republican bloodied but alive, right-wingers have unleashed a torrent of criticism on the Secret Service for having women in its ranks. 

Several women can be seen among the black-suited, sunglasses-clad agents racing to shield Trump with their bodies as the gunshots ring out at the rally, before hustling him from the stage and into a waiting car and safety.

But they, along with their boss Kimberly Cheatle — only the second-ever woman director of the federal agency tasked with protecting presidents current, former and would-be — are now caught in the intense scrutiny over the nearly catastrophic attack.

“There should not be any women in the Secret Service. These are supposed to be the very best, and none of the very best at this job are women,” right-wing activist Matt Walsh wrote on X, in one typical post.

Many of the attacks cited DEI — diversity, equity and inclusivity — hiring practices that some Republicans have long criticized as discriminating against white people, white men in particular.

“The results of DEI. DEI got someone killed,” read one post on the popular Libs of TikTok account.

The Secret Service has defended itself against such accusations in the past, with a spokesman telling US media just weeks before the assassination attempt that agents “are held to the highest professional standards… at no time has the agency lowered these standards.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Grand Rapids:

Donald Trump will hold his first campaign rally on Saturday since he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt one week ago and fresh from his nominating convention where his takeover of the Republican Party was cemented.

Trump will appear in Grand Rapids, in the battleground state of Michigan, along with his new vice presidential pick, Ohio U.S. Senator J.D. Vance. It will be their first campaign event together as the now official Republican presidential ticket.

Republican Party officials said during Trump’s nominating convention in Milwaukee this week that his brush with death last Saturday had changed him, and that when he made his acceptance speech on Thursday night he would call for national unity.

While Trump began the address with a call for unity and national healing, much of his speech was his well-known list of grievances and attacks on opponents.

It is unclear what type of a speech Trump will deliver on Saturday, but his diehard supporters typically flock to such events to hear Trump’s more traditional inflammatory rhetoric.

Trump and Vance will take the stage in Grand Rapids with the Republican Party unified behind them after this week’s nominating convention. In contrast, the Democrats are in turmoil and it is no longer certain that President Joe Biden will be the Democratic nominee facing Trump in the Nov. 5 election.

Biden is facing mounting calls from many elected officials in his own party to step aside as the party’s White House candidate and to end his re-election bid, after his poor debate performance against Trump last month.

Biden is trailing in opinion polls and is behind in every swing state against Trump. Many Democrats fear he may have virtually no path to victory and that the party needs a new presidential candidate to take on Trump.

The rally in Grand Rapids will be in an indoor arena, unlike the event in Butler, Pennsylvania last weekend, which was outdoors. At that event, the gunman was able to scale the roof of a building outside the Secret Service perimeter before opening fire on Trump, clipping his ear, killing a rally-goer and wounding several others.

The U.S. Secret Service, which is responsible for protecting Trump, declined to comment on security for the Grand Rapids event. An investigation is under way into the security failures at the Butler rally.

“The Secret Service does not discuss the means and methods used for our protective operations,” the agency said in a statement.

Trump gave a detailed account of his narrow brush with death in his convention speech on Thursday, telling the audience that he was only talking to them “by the grace of Almighty God.”

(Reporting by Tim Reid in Grand Rapids, editing by Ross Colvin and Alistair Bell)

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Milwaukee:

Five days after narrowly escaping assassination, Donald Trump will accept his presidential nomination on Thursday before an adoring crowd of supporters, the final act in his transformation of the Republican Party into the party of Trump.

His brush with death has fueled the growing quasi-religious fervor among the party faithful, elevating him from political leader to a man they believe is protected by God.

“Trump, Trump, Trump,” attendees roared at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee when he appeared each night this week, his right ear bandaged, to listen to speaker after speaker intone reverentially about him and reference God’s hand in his survival from a would-be assassin’s bullet.

Republicans are uniting behind him this week. With most dissent quelled and his grip on the party never tighter, Trump will be in a much stronger position than in his 2017-2021 term to follow through on his agenda if he wins the Nov. 5 election.

Untrammeled by the internal divisions that sometimes stymied him in his first term, Trump would be freer to pursue hard-edged policies that include mass deportations as part of a crackdown on illegal migration, aggressive trade policies, and dismissing government officials seen as insufficiently loyal.

Even if Trump retakes the White House, Republicans take control of both houses of Congress, and conservatives go on holding a Supreme Court super majority, there would still be institutional checks on a second Trump term.

 

He could be kept in check by Congress, the courts, and a public that elects a new Congress every two years and a president every four years, constitutional experts say.

Nevertheless, many Trump supporters want to see a powerful president.

“You need a strong leader at the top,” said Bill Dowd, a 79-year-old lumber business owner who was a guest of the Colorado delegation in Milwaukee.

“I’m a very, very big Ronald Reagan fan. Ronald Reagan pulled the party together also,” Dowd said.

Dowd acknowledged that some of his Republican friends feared that Trump might try to abuse his power. He said while he did not share that fear he believed that dissent should not be stifled in any party.

For Trump’s critics and political opponents, this is a dark and disturbing moment: they see the modern Republican Party as a cult of personality, a base from which Trump could pursue extreme policies and create America’s first truly imperial presidency, threatening the future of its democratic norms.

“Donald Trump has called for the ‘termination’ of the Constitution, promised to be a ‘dictator’ ‘on day one,’ and now his Supreme Court justices say he can rule without any checks on his power,” said Ammar Moussa, campaign spokesman for incumbent President Joe Biden, Trump’s Democratic rival.

“Trump is a liar, but we believe him when he says he will rule as a dictator,” Moussa said.

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said Democratic assertions that Trump threatens American democracy and could become an autocrat if reelected were “fear-mongering” and a “blatant effort to deceive the American people.”

An Unrestricted Trump

In Milwaukee, nearly all of the 30 delegates, guests, and elected Republicans interviewed by Reuters for this story acknowledged that their party had become the party of Trump but dismissed any suggestion that it had become cult-like.

“I believe that President Trump is a transformational figure, a man of destiny who God providentially saved from death on Saturday,” Louisiana delegate Ed Tarpley said. “He’s been given a special mission in our country. God’s providential hand has elevated Donald Trump to a different status.”

Those interviewed said they wanted a President Trump who was not constrained by bureaucracy or Congress to execute his agenda. They were in favor of a more expansive use of executive action – decisions made by a president that do not need congressional approval.

They want nothing to stand in the way of his plans to deport millions of people in the country illegally and to reduce the size of the federal bureaucracy. In his first term Trump often complained of “deep state” bureaucrats he said were seeking to thwart him.

“The president… must be allowed to implement his policies free of a bureaucracy resistant to them and unelected officials who do not agree with them,” Tarpley said.

There are constitutional limits to what Trump can do through the power of his office, however, and any policies could still face lawsuits.

“I think the fears of critics are overblown, in the sense that they’re more worried about the substance of his likely policies than the possibility that they’ll be adopted through unilateral executive action,” Stewart Baker, a former general counsel for the U.S. National Security Agency, said.

If Trump goes too far, his opponents say, they may still be able to count on federal courts to check him.

“We are mindful of the fact that we have a very conservative Supreme Court. But what we have found is that even Trump-appointed judges have ruled against his policies and found them illegal,” said Kica Matos, president of the National Immigration Law Center.

Half of Republican respondents to a Reuters/Ipsos poll this week said they agreed with the statement that “the country is in a crisis and needs a strong president who should be allowed to rule without too much interference from the courts and Congress.”

That was substantially higher than the 35% of Democrats and 33% of independents who agreed with the sentiment.

Only one convention attendee interviewed by Reuters, a senior Republican from a southern state, said he was worried about a second Trump administration. He said he feared Trump would become an autocrat, fill government agencies with yes men, and seek revenge on his political enemies.

Referring to Trump’s pledge to supporters that he will be their “retribution,” the Republican, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “That effort will be horrendous.”

Trump was widely criticized for saying during the campaign that should he win, he will be a “dictator” – if only for a day, a comment he later said was a joke.

Democrats have rebuked him for promising to pardon his supporters imprisoned for the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol that was triggered by his refusal to accept his 2020 election loss.

Trump, who was convicted of making hush money payments to a former porn star and faces charges related to his efforts to overturn Biden’s victory, has threatened to use the Justice Department to pursue opponents, including Biden. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Former Republican presidential candidate Asa Hutchinson said he was concerned about the lack of constraints on Trump in a second term.

“The Department of Justice is probably the perfect example of that. Clearly, a President Trump would have a close hand at directing the activities of the Justice Department,” Hutchinson, a former governor of Arkansas, told Reuters.

Making ‘Nixon Blush’

The implications of a second Trump term are profoundly disturbing for America and the world, said presidential historian Timothy Naftali, a former director at the presidential library of Richard Nixon, who resigned from office in disgrace in 1974 after the Watergate scandal.

Naftali said a recent Supreme Court decision granting sweeping immunity to a president for most acts while in office, combined with a pliant Republican Party, means there are limited constraints on Trump should he act maliciously and exploit the office for his own personal power and political retribution.

“He can gut the Justice Department and engage in a revenge tour that would make Nixon blush,” Naftali said.

To be sure, Trump would not be the first president to test the limits of executive power. Leaders including former Democratic presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Barack Obama have taken an expansive view of their authority.

Even with the July 1 ruling by the high court on presidential immunity, Trump ostensibly would still be bound by the U.S. Constitution’s separation of powers that reserves key functions to Congress and the judiciary.

Lara Trump, the Republican National Committee co-chair, and Trump’s daughter-in-law acknowledged this week that governance by executive action – which can be overturned in the courts or by a successor – was not ideal. That’s why it was crucial for Republicans to hold onto the House of Representatives in November and take the Senate from Democrats, she said, “so we don’t have to rely on executive actions and we can actually see some lasting change.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Milwaukee:

At the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee this week, a fashion trend with a difference has emerged – fake ear bandages, donned by attendees as a symbolic gesture of support for Donald Trump.

Trump has appeared at the convention wearing a large bandage where a would-be assassin’s bullet grazed his right ear at a rally on Saturday.

“We’re helping President Trump set a new fashion statement,” said Arizona delegate Susan Ellsworth. “We’re standing in solidarity with him for his wound. And we just want him to know how much we love him.”

The four-day convention will culminate with a prime-time address by Trump on Thursday when he formally accepts the party’s nomination to face Democrat Joe Biden in a rematch of their 2020 race.

Delegate Michael Schafer, sporting a bandage taped to his right ear, said the trend was not quite the same as the ubiquitous red “Make America Great Again” hat.

“I think it’s something that’s of the moment,” he said.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

A head tilt to see a chart microseconds before the bullet’s impact saved former US President Donald Trump from certain death. 

A TikTok account, PointConsciousness, tracked the trajectory of the ballistic with a graphic showing how the head tilt saved Trump from losing his life at the rally in Pennsylvania’s Butler. 

Almost two seconds before the bullet’s impact, the right side of Mr Trump’s head was in the round’s trajectory. A second later, the former US President leaned toward his left and tilted his head slightly right – the AR-15 rifle’s bullet grazed his right ear, with blood spattering on his face.

WOW … 100% a miracle.

pic.twitter.com/cuk6qtnwI1

— Catturd (@catturd2) July 16, 2024

How A Chart Saved Mr Trump’s Life

Trump, a hardliner on immigration issues, told Texas Congressman Ronny Jackson, also a doctor, a few hours after the assassination attempt as to how a chart saved his life. In an interview with the New York Times, Mr Jackson recounts what Mr Trump told him over the phone.

The chart featured statistics on immigration during President Joe Biden’s regime.

Mr Trump credited the border patrol for “saving his life”. He was referring to a chart with immigration statistics on a screen to his right. He tilted his head to take a look at the chart, and that is when the bullet hit his ear, narrowly missing his head. 

Mr Jackson’s nephew was also injured at the rally, he wrote on X. “Thankfully his injury was not serious and he is doing well. My family was sitting in the front, near where the President was speaking. They heard shots ringing out – my nephew then realized he had blood on his neck and something had grazed and cut his neck. He was treated by the providers in the medical tent. Thank you to all those that have reached out to check on him. “

My nephew was injured at the Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Thankfully his injury was not serious and he is doing well. My family was sitting in the front, near where the President was speaking. They heard shots ringing out — my nephew then realized he had blood on his neck…

— Ronny Jackson (@RonnyJacksonTX) July 14, 2024

“The President and the survivors are lucky to be alive,” he added.

‘Confusion And Fear Had Set In’

The mood was upbeat and there “didn’t seem to be anything wrong at all”, Jason Vecchio, a man who attended the Trump campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, told NDTV. Mr Vechhio, who was 150 steps away from the stage, said that it was a very positive experience until the former president was shot at and then a kind of “confusion and fear set in”.

“Those bullets whizzed by him, hit the machine and the boom came down because it hit a hydraulic line. We see Secret Service jump on top of him, to shield him and protect him. It wasn’t like instantly that we knew what was going on. Sounded like gunfire because I have been around firearms. We got down and heard the gunfire stop. At that point, I ran over to the fence, hopped over the fence and took cover under a police car just because I wasn’t sure if there was a secondary shooter or if a shooter was in the crowd. No one had any idea where the shooter was. So I just wanted to be in the safest place I could be in.

“And then we all watched Trump stand up and put his fist in the air and we all stood up and started chanting. It was quite an experience. It was quite a moving moment to see him stand up after we all just thought he died. And then I walked over to the fence and walked over to my buddies and together we opened the fence and started funnelling everybody through the exit,” said Mr Vechhio, recounting what he saw at the event.

‘Snipers Spotted Shooters Before Attack’

The assassination attempt has changed the course of the presidential election campaign, with the Republican party more united and rallying behind its candidate, Donald Trump. Probe agencies are still searching for clues on what led to Crooks attacking Mr Trump.

The Secret Service, responsible for protecting US political leaders, has faced backlash over how a gunman aiming an assault rifle was allowed to take a position on a roof some 500 feet from Trump.

Footage has emerged of people sighting the gunman on the roof and trying to warn security before he opened fire. According to CBS News, there were three snipers stationed inside the building the shooter used. The operations plan had them stationed inside the building looking out windows toward the Trump rally. Crooks took out a rangefinder and the Secret Service sniper radioed to the command post, CBS News reported. 

Officers believe that the shooter might have used an air conditioning unit to get on top of the roof.

New Delhi:

The US Secret Service is under fire over its most stunning failure in decades following the assassination attempt on Donald Trump and several witnesses claiming that they had flagged the shooter to the officials before he took the shot are only adding to the crisis.

The questions facing the authorities are how a 20-year-old lone shooter was able to spot an exposed rooftop barely a football field away from the former president, assume the position, and take the shots, and why did officials not act despite several attendees pointing out the “shooter” on the roof. 

One “citizen journalist” Grant Godwin posted a video filmed by supporters at the Trump rally that showed the alleged shooter getting in position.

“Officer! Officer!” a person is heard calling out to the security officials posted nearby and another saying, “Yeah, someone is on the roof”, and pointing to the alleged shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks.

The “shooter” is seen climbing the roof of a shed, approximately just 400 ft, or less than 150 metres, from the stage where Trump was. He tries to stay down, crawling his way forward after getting on the roof. 

“Someone’s on top of the roof… Right there… You see him? He’s laying down… Yeah, he is laying down,” a person is heard saying.  

“Yeah, look, there he is…” said another.

Sharing the video on Instagram, Godwin wrote: “HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?! The amount of time the Secret Service and law enforcement had to neutralise this threat is ridiculous. I cannot wrap my head around this. You’re telling me rally attendees noticed this guy way ahead of time, informed law enforcement, and still they didn’t take this guy out before a shot was taken? Extremely concerning.”

Reacting to the video, a user wrote: “I’ve seen better security at Foot Locker.”

“So some random 20-year-old kid just is lucky enough to access the one spot to be able to have a clear shot of Trump? The only place they needed to secure? It makes no sense,” said another.

“Walmart security could’ve taken that dude out,” noted a third.

As world financial markets started to reopen after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, one thing seemed likely: The Trump trade will get even more momentum.

The series of wagers – based on anticipation that the Republican’s return to the White House would usher in tax cuts, higher tariffs, and looser regulations – had already been gaining ground since President Joe Biden’s poor performance in last month’s debate imperiled his re-election campaign.

But the trades were expected to take deeper hold, with Trump galvanizing supporters and drawing sympathy by exhibiting defiant resilience after being shot in the ear on stage at a Pennsylvania rally.

The dollar – which would gain if loose fiscal policy kept bond yields elevated – started to move higher against most peers early in Asia trading, with the Mexico peso leading the slide, weakening 0.3%. Bitcoin rose above $60,000, potentially reflecting Trump’s crypto-friendly stance, while futures on the S&P 500 Index for September rose 0.2% at 08:47 p.m. in New York.

“For us, the news does reinforce that Trump’s the frontrunner,” said Mark McCormick, global head of foreign-exchange and emerging-market strategy at Toronto Dominion Bank. “We remain US dollar bulls for the second half and early 2025.”

To be sure, there’s still plenty of room for surprises with almost four months to go in the US election campaign. The emergence of political violence may deepen concern about instability in the US and push investors into haven assets, potentially overshadowing some of the market positioning that has already taken place in the run-up to the election.

While future contracts on 10-year Treasury notes for September showed declines in early Asia trading, US government bonds tend to rally when investors seek temporary safety, so that may distort the Trump trade in the Treasuries market, which hinges on wagering that the yield curve will steepen as long-term bonds underperform on anticipation that Trump’s fiscal and trade policies will fan inflation pressures.

Moreover, some investors may want to book early gains or be wary of getting deeper into an already crowded position.

“Political risk is binary and hard to hedge, and uncertainty was high as it is with the close nature of the race,” said Priya Misra, a portfolio manager at JPMorgan Investment Management.

“This adds to volatility. I think it further increases the chance of a Republican sweep,” she said, adding that “could put steepening pressure on the curve.”

Equity investors are preparing for at least a near-term jump in volatility when S&P 500 futures start trading at 6 p.m. in New York.

While traders generally don’t expect Trump’s assassination attempt to derail the stock-market trajectory in the long run, a pick-up in near-term price swings is likely. The market has already been contending with speculation that valuations have become too stretched, given the boom in artificial-intelligence stocks and the risks posed by elevated interest rates and political uncertainty.

But investors have also been anticipating that bank, health-care and oil-industry stocks would benefit from a Trump victory.

“The attack will boost volatility,” said David Mazza, CEO at Roundhill Investments, predicting investors could seek temporary safety in defensive stocks like mega-cap companies. He said it “also adds support for stocks that do well in a steepening yield curve, especially financials.”

The early reaction echoes what was seen after the first presidential debate in late June, when Biden’s weak performance was seen as fueling Trump’s election odds.

The dollar advanced during that event, and investors soon began embracing a wager that involves buying shorter-maturity notes and selling longer-term ones – known as a steepener trade. That trade has been paying off, with the 30-year Treasury yields jumping to nearly 5 basis points below 2-year ones from around 37 basis points below ahead of the debate.

“If the market sense that Trump’s chances to win are higher than they were on Friday – then we would expect the back end of the bond market to sell off in the manner we saw in the immediate aftermath of the debate,” Michael Purves, CEO and founder of Tallbacken Capital Advisors, wrote in an email.

While bond traders have been pricing in at least two interest-rate reductions in 2024, a major boost in Trump’s election odds could push the Federal Reserve toward staying on hold for longer, according to Purves.

“Trump’s stated policies are (at least now) more inflationary than Biden’s,” he wrote, “and we think the Fed will want to accumulate as much dry power as possible.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

The US Secret Service was under intense scrutiny on Sunday after a gunman managed to evade its agents and open fire on former President Donald Trump at a political rally, with Republican leaders vowing swift investigations and President Joe Biden calling for an independent review.

The gunman, a 20-year-old Pennsylvania man, injured Trump and killed a rally attendee from a rooftop perch around 150 yards (140 m) from the stage where the former president was speaking in Butler, Pennsylvania, near Pittsburgh, officials said.

Trump, 78, who like other former presidents has lifetime protection by the Secret Service, was swarmed by agents who then rushed him away. Agents killed the shooter, identified by the FBI as Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, and an AR-15-style semiautomatic was recovered near his body, officials said.

Trump says a bullet hit his upper right ear but that he is otherwise doing well and would travel to the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, where he will receive his party’s presidential nomination.

Mike Johnson, speaker of the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives, said panels in the chamber will call officials from the Secret Service, the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI for hearings.

“The American people deserve to know the truth,” Johnson said.

The House oversight panel called Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle to testify on July 22.

The Secret Service, tasked with protecting current and former presidents, is part of the Department of Homeland Security. The department’s Office of the Inspector General is responsible for conducting oversight of Secret Service operations.

A spokesman for the inspector general’s office did not respond to questions about whether it would launch its own inquiry. The FBI said in a statement following the shooting that it would be the lead federal law enforcement agency in the investigation into the shooting.

In a statement, Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said the agency had “added protective resources (and) technology (and) capabilities as part of the increased campaign travel tempo.”

Guglielmi denied accusations that the agency had rebuffed requests for more security resources from Trump’s team.

In televised remarks, Biden, 81, said that Trump, as a former president who is the Republicans’ nominee for president in the Nov. 5 election, already receives a heightened level of security.

“I’ve been consistent in my direction of the Secret Service to provide him with every resource, capability and protective measure necessary to ensure his continued safety,” Biden, a Democrat, said.

He said he had “directed an independent review of the national security at yesterday’s rally to assess exactly what happened,” the results of which will be shared with the public.

On Sunday, Democratic Congressman Ritchie Torres said that he and Republican Congressman Mike Lawler are planning to introduce a bill that would call for enhanced security for all presidential candidates.

‘Full Rifle Kit’

Paul Eckloff, a former Secret Service agent who retired in 2020, said agents would have surveyed all the rooftops with a line of sight ahead of time.

“This person either concealed themselves until they became a threat, or were not a threat until they revealed their weapons,” said Eckloff.

In the moments after Trump was injured, the former president was quickly surrounded by Secret Service personnel who formed a human shield, while heavily armed agents in body armor and toting rifles also took to the stage and appeared to scan the area for threats.

Trump was whisked by the agents to a black SUV, and taken to a local hospital, according to the campaign.

Trump supporters blasted the Secret Service as having failed to protect the former president. Billionaire Elon Musk called for the agency’s leadership to resign.

“How was a sniper with a full rifle kit allowed to bear crawl onto the closest roof to a presidential nominee,” asked conservative activist Jack Posobiec on social media.

“There will be an intensive review” of the incident and “there’s going to be a massive realignment,” said Joseph LaSorsa, a former Secret Service agent who served on the presidential detail. “This cannot happen.”

Securing Trump Rallies

During most of Trump’s campaign stops, local police aid the Secret Service in securing the venue. Agents from other agencies within the Department of Homeland Security, such as the Transportation Security Administration, occasionally help.

Many Trump rallies feature thousands of audience members, take place in the open air and last for hours.

Before the event, agents scan the venue for bombs or other threats, and Trump invariably arrives in a fortified motorcade.

Law enforcement officials typically put up barriers as a perimeter, and require all attendees to go through a metal detector to enter the venue. Armed protective agents search all attendees’ bags and even wallets. Many rallygoers are patted down by hand.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)