RT News (Russia Today) app is seen on a smartphone in this illustration.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Russia said on Thursday (September 5, 2024) that new U.S. sanctions on its state-funded media RT were part of an “information campaign” ahead of November presidential elections, saying it was working on a response.

The U.S. on Wednesday indicted two RT employees and slapped its top editors with sanctions, accusing them of trying to influence the upcoming election.

The 10 individuals and two entities sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department included RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan and her deputy Elizaveta Brodskaia.

“It is an obvious operation, an information campaign… that was long prepared and that is needed ahead of the last stage of the electoral cycle,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told state news agency RIA Novosti.

She added that “of course, [a response] is being prepared”, warning that it will be harsh and that it will make “everyone shudder.”

Most of U.S. media have downsized or pulled out their staff from Russia after Moscow launched its Ukraine offensive, which was accompanied at home with a massive crackdown on dissent.

The U.S. also indicted two Russia-based RT employees, accusing them of funnelling $10 million to a Tennessee-based company that used social media influence to “create and distribute content to U.S. audiences with hidden Russian government messaging.”

New Delhi:

In her acceptance speech for the Democratic nomination, Kamala Harris vowed to resist the influence of authoritarian leaders, who she implied have allegedly manipulated Donald Trump’s foreign policy by appealing to his autocratic tendencies. In a bid to position herself against Republican frontrunner Trump, Harris is stressing her resolve on national security, portraying the billionaire as a riskier alternative.

In her speech, Harris made it abundantly clear that her presidency would mark a definitive break from the Trump era, particularly in foreign policy. “I will not cozy up to tyrants and dictators,” she declared.

As Dr Sweta Chakraborty, a Climate Surrogate for the Harris campaign, explains, Harris’s approach to policy formation is rooted in a clear-eyed assessment of the threats facing the country, both from foreign adversaries and from within. Dr Chakraborty, who has been closely involved in the campaign and was present at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago, noted that Harris’s message is resonating strongly with Indian-Americans and other minority communities who see in her as their leader.

Indian-American Perspective

“Kamala Harris is polling a few points ahead of Donald Trump and will surely get a surge following the DNC. Indian-Americans like myself are banding together and supporting her through various efforts and speciality collaborations. For example, we are raising funds through ‘South Asians in Climate’ after the DNC and ahead of the ‘Harris for President Climate Group’ official launch this September. South Asians are in. Climate voters are in, and as a South Asian climate surrogate, I represent both voter groups that broadly support Kamala Harris for President,” Dr Chakraborty told NDTV.

READ | When Kamala Harris Gave Her Watch To ‘Chitthi’: Aunt Recalls Fond Memories

Born in Oakland, California in 1964, Harris’s father is Donald Harris, a man of Afro-Jamaican descent while his mother is Shyamala Gopalan, who emigrated to the US at the age of 19 to pursue her doctorate in nutrition and endocrinology.

“Having a President who shares ancestry with South Asians in America shows that South Asian immigrants and their offspring have a clear place in America. A daughter of India can make it to the highest elected office in the United States, which shows that the sky is the limit for the Indian diaspora in the US. Indians in the US already enjoy the status as the highest-earning demographic. An Indian will elevate that status and make history for minorities and women more broadly,” Dr Chakraborty said. 

The Usha Vance Factor

However, Harris is not the only Indian-American whose name and image are plastered across the US presidential campaign. Over at the Republican camp, Trump’s Vice President pick JD Vance’s wife is Usha Vance who traces her roots to Andhra Pradesh’s Vadluru. 

Usha’s father, Chilukuri Radhakrishnan, was brought up in Chennai but went to the US to pursue higher studies. Usha was raised in San Diego, California and she met JD Vance at Yale Law School before getting married in 2014. 

Video | Kamala Harris’ Grandnieces’ Tutorial On Pronouncing Leader’s Name

“Usha Vance and her husband are trading in their morals for power,” Dr Chakraborty alleged. “It is clear they had authentically shared liberal values with friends and classmates from university, but edited and adjusted their stances to maneuver in the conservative party, which they perceived would be the easier route to power.”

Kamala Harris vs Donald Trump 

Dr Chakraborty highlighted a stark contrast between Harris and Trump: where Trump has prioritised tax breaks for billionaires and deregulation of corporate polluters, Harris has pledged to hold the oil and gas industry accountable, invest in a clean energy economy, and ensure that the benefits of climate action are shared by all Americans, not just the wealthy elite.

When Harris ran for vice president in 2020, her climate plan was even more aggressive than what ultimately passed during Joe Biden’s presidency as the Inflation Reduction Act – a landmark climate legislation in American history. Now, as she prepares to release her full climate agenda in September, Harris is positioning herself as the ‘Climate President’ for the United States, Dr Chakraborty said. 

“As an Indian woman, she also represents members of American society that have been historically disenfranchised. She is physically the opposite of Biden and represents the ascendency of women and a future society that is more equitable and fair to all genders and races,” she said. 

Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump reacts during a campaign rally, at the North Carolina Aviation Museum & Hall of Fame in Asheboro, North Carolina.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

In his first outdoor rally since last month’s assassination attempt, Donald Trump appeared on stage in North Carolina to talk about national security as part of his weeklong trip across the country to draw attention away from Democrats and their national convention.

“Seventy-six days from now, we’re going to win this state and we’re going to win the White House,” Trump said at the North Carolina Aviation Museum & Hall of Fame from behind a podium surrounded by panes of bulletproof glass that formed a protective wall across the stage.

Storage containers were stacked around the perimeter to create additional walls and block sight lines. Snipers were positioned on roofs at the venue, where old aircraft were sitting behind the podium and a large American flag was suspended from cranes.

The event, billed as being focused on national security issues, is part of Trump’s weeklong series of counterprogramming to the Democratic National Convention, which is underway in Chicago. Allies have been urging him to focus on policy instead of personal attacks as he struggles to adjust to running against Vice President Kamala Harris after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race.

On Tuesday night, the convention showcased a double dose of Obama firepower, as the former president and former first lady assailed Trump, calling him out repeatedly by name.

“His limited and narrow view of the world made him feel threatened by the existence of two hardworking, highly educated, successful people who happen to be Black,” Michelle Obama said of Trump in a rousing speech.

She also referenced a comment he made in a June debate, asking: “Who’s going to tell him that the job he’s currently seeking might just be one of those ‘Black jobs’?”

Barack Obama mocked Trump’s obsession with his crowd sizes and called Trump “a 78-year-old billionaire who hasn’t stopped whining about his problems since he rode down his golden escalator nine years ago.”

“It’s been a constant stream of gripes and grievances that’s actually gotten worse now that he’s afraid of losing to Kamala,” the former president said.

Trump was joined Wednesday by his running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, who cast Harris as a candidate selected by power brokers instead of voters and lambasted her vice presidential pick, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, before Trump took the stage.

That included continuing to hammer Walz for, at times, mischaracterizing his service record as an Army National Guard member, as well as Walz’s retirement from service before his unit’s deployment to Iraq.

“What won’t Stolen Valor Tim Walz lie about?” Vance, who served four years as a Marine, asked the crowd.

Trump has spent the week visiting battleground states in his busiest week of campaigning since the Republican primaries.

Reflecting the importance of North Carolina in this year’s election, the trip is Trump’s second to the state in just the past week. Last Wednesday, he appeared in Asheville, North Carolina, for a speech on the economy.

Trump won North Carolina by a comfortable margin in 2016. The state delivered the former president his closest statewide margin of victory four years ago and is once again considered a key battleground in 2024.

Before Trump arrived, his plane did a flyover of the rally site. The crowd erupted into cheers.

Edna Ryan, a 68-year-old retired flight attendant and private pilot, said she was bullish on the Republican’s chances, but said: “We need to be strong because otherwise we’re going to be very sorry.”

Lisa Watts, a retired business owner from Hickory, North Carolina, who was attending her fifth Trump rally, said she’s feeling “very positive” about the race against Harris.

“A month ago they never spoke her name and now she’s like, quote quote the ‘savior for the country,’” Watts said. “I don’t think that her record proves that she is ready to run this country.”

Watts said she doesn’t think Trump’s chances of winning are much different now from when Biden was the Democratic nominee.

“I think the Democrats are going to try to do everything they can to keep her up on that pedestal,” she said, predicting the hype around Harris will fade.

Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a visit to the Livingston County Sheriff’s Office in Howell, Michigan.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Former President Donald Trump pledged on Tuesday to “Make America Safe Again” while campaigning in Michigan as the Democrats who gathered in Chicago to nominate Kamala Harris branded him a career criminal.

As part of a battleground campaign swing designed to counter the Democratic National Convention, Trump stood alongside sheriff’s deputies in the city of Howell and tarred Harris, a former San Francisco district attorney and California attorney general, as the “ringleader” of a “Marxist attack on law enforcement” across the country.

“Kamala Harris will deliver crime, chaos, destruction and death,” Trump said in one of many generalizations about an America under Harris. “You’ll see levels of crime that you’ve never seen before. … I will deliver law, order, safety and peace.” Trump has sought in recent weeks to blunt the enthusiasm that Harris has attracted since President Joe Biden ended his reelection campaign and endorsed her. That has involved both dark predictions about what electing Harris would mean for the country and efforts by Trump’s advisers to set up events where he can try to draw specific policy contrasts. On Tuesday in Michigan, the subject was crime and public safety.

“Our policemen and women have the backs of law-abiding citizens every day,” Trump said. “When we go back to the White House, you’re going to see support the likes of which you haven’t seen, certainly in four years.” In excerpts released before his speech, Trump’s campaign also said he would call for the death penalty for child rapists and child traffickers; he did not mention that during his remarks.

Also read: Trump posts image of fake Taylor Swift endorsement

The event was the latest billed as focused on a specific issue. But on these occasions, Trump has spent considerable time attacking Harris personally and taking shots at Biden, and the same was true after their appearances on Monday at the Democratic convention.

“I watched last night in amazement as they tried to pretend everything was great,” Trump said, singling out inflation and the U.S.-Mexico border as topics Democrats glossed over. “We have a fool as president,” he said of Biden.

Trump presented a bleak portrait of life in the U.S. and the threat of a Harris presidency, though he was short on specifics and heavy on hyperbole.

“It’s just insane,” Trump said. “You can’t walk across the street to get a loaf of bread. You get shot, you get mugged, you get raped, you get whatever it may be. And you’ve seen it, and I’ve seen it, and it’s time for a change.” Trump making such claims, surrounded by supportive law enforcement officers, stood in stark contrast to the Democrats’ convention. Speaker after speaker found ways Monday night in Chicago to remind Americans that Trump is the first former president ever convicted of felony crimes, has been found civilly liable for sexual assault, and still faces multiple indictments, including for his efforts to overturn his 2020 defeat to Biden.

Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas skewered Trump on Monday night as “a career criminal, with 34 felonies, two impeachments and one porn star,” a reference to his payments to an adult film actress at issue in his New York conviction for business fraud.

As the crowd roared, Crockett kept going, hailing Harris as a former prosecutor who “has a resume” while Trump “has a rap sheet.” The derision reached its peak as Hillary Clinton, whom Trump defeated in 2016, stood back from the podium and smiled as delegates chanted: “Lock him up! Lock him up!” — a turnabout from Trump supporters’ chants about Clinton eight years ago despite the former secretary of state never having been charged with any crime.

Former President Donald Trump has posted a fake social media image of pop superstar Taylor Swift asking people to vote for him in the November election. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Former President Donald Trump has posted a fake social media image of pop superstar Taylor Swift asking people to vote for him in the November election.

A Sunday entry by the Republican candidate on Truth Social showed Swift dressed in red, white and blue with a caption that said “Taylor Swift Wants You To Vote For Donald Trump.”

“I accept!” Trump wrote.

Swift has not publicly endorsed a candidate in the 2024 race but has supported Democrats in the past.

Also read: Dealing with deepfakes

The singer backed President Joe Biden and running mate Kamala Harris in 2020. Harris is set to be formally nominated as the 2024 Democratic candidate at the party’s national convention in Chicago this week. She also criticized Trump in a 2020 documentary.

Spokespeople for Swift and Trump did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Trump also posted photos of young women wearing “Swifties for Trump” shirts, and a satirical article with the headline “Swifties Turning to Trump After ISIS Foiled Taylor Swift Concert.” The article was marked “SATIRE” above the headline.

Swift canceled three shows in Vienna this month after authorities said they had foiled a planned attack. Local officials arrested a 19-year-old man who they said was inspired by Islamic State.

Several Swift fans and watchdog groups said many of the images posted by Trump appeared to be deepfakes generated by artificial intelligence.

Advocates in the music industry, Hollywood and Washington have been pushing for federal legislation and other measures to fight the explosion of fake AI images online.

Trump’s post was “yet another example of AI’s power to create misinformation,” consumer group Public Citizen said.

“The potential harms to our society that could result from such misinformation, including abuses of our elections, are wide-reaching and immensely damaging,” the group added.

At the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Swift fan Rebecca Goff handed out friendship bracelets, a common practice among the singer’s fans, at a Nevada Democratic Party breakfast.

Goff, 39, said she felt Trump was the antithesis of what she believes Swift stands for, including celebrating girlhood and womanhood. “That’s like the antithesis of what Trump and the GOP are trying to do, especially to women. They’re trying to make us smaller. They want us to go back to being just housewives, child bearers,” Goff said.

Where does the Indian diaspora stand on Kamala v Usha, and is Desi heritage now a fixture in U.S. politics?

Feisty messages coming in from the Harris and Trump campaigns in the U.S. in those latest ads.

Less than a month since U.S. President Joseph Biden bowed out of the Presidential race- and we had spoken about the possibilities in WorldView on June 19, just 2 days before he withdrew his nomination- the U.S. elections race has dramatically changed.

The tables have turned former President Donald Trump with Polls showing the new Democratic choice Kamala Harris doing better than Trump in many national polls, and an edge in some key states, but it’s stick neck and neck. As the campaign now enters a crucial phase, and what are some of the key factors that you should watch out for as you follow the very complex U.S. Presidential process?

Here are some of the dates to watch out for:

 August 19-22: Next week, Democratic National Convention in Chicago- will formally nominate Harris-Walz- Biden will speak on the 19th and Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Bill Clinton are all due to speak as well

September 10: Trump and Harris will hold their first debate- remember Harris was nominated Vice President in 2020, and hence has not really had to debate since the Primaries that year- so it will be crucial to watch how they fair in this one.

October 1: Walz- Vance debate

There will be one more Harris-Trump debate in October before

November 5: Election Day

Where are the polls today?

Real Clear Polling- that shows you that in 3 weeks, Harris came up from behind Trump – where Biden was, and since August 5 has been ahead of Trump by a percentage point or so- remember the margin of errors are always about 3-5% so these could easily be reversed in reality. But the trend of the polls seems clear- More blue than red, more in favour of Harris than Trump

So how significant is the Desi vote in the U.S.- do Indian-Americans make up a significant voting bloc.

-Indian Americans make up only 1.5% of the U.S. Population

-Yet they are a prominent community in public life

According to one list at present

There are 6 Indian Americans in Congress

– About 175 in the U.S. government Biden administration

– And about 100 others in various prominent positions in the government, as governors, mayors and judges across the country

 They are also amongst the most educated and per capita highest income diaspora communities- which means they are influential political donors

According to the Indiaspora group that released a report this week, about 65% Indian-Americans vote Democrat while the rest vote Republican. In 2020 it was 72% Democrat

While both Kamala Harris and Trump vice presidential running mate JD Vance’s wife Usha Vance each have atleast one parent born in India, neither put too much stress on their Indian-American origins at present- for different reasons, but identity did come centrestage last week

Trump’s comments caused a stir, and some pushback from bi-racial and African american activists

Vance said he was targeted by Trump’s far right supporters for not being white, but loved her anyway

While Harris has yet to say much one way or another publicly on her Indian identity this time around she called herself the first VP of African American and South Asian descent in 2020. Remember she has thus far not sat down to one interview with a journalist or a press conference since announcing her campaign- so maybe that’s what to watch out for

WV Take: The fact that both the Democrat and Republican candidates have Indian diaspora connections says a lot about the prominence of the Indian-American community, and particularly the emergence of Indian-American women, which is a credit to the diaspora everywhere, and will make the Indian-American vote in November more closely watched. As we have said here before, having a diaspora leader in positions of power in any country is a matter of pride for Indians- but don’t expect it to impact bilateral foreign relations that are based on interests more than personal identities.

 WV Book Recommendations

Kamala Harris: Phenomenal Woman by Chidanand Rajghatta

Kamala Harris: The American Story that Began on India’s Shores- by Kamala Harris and Hansa Makhijani

The Presidency of Donald J. Trump: A First Historical Assessment by Julian E. Zelizer

Hillbilly Elegy: A memoir of a family and culture in crisis by JD Vance

The Road to the White House 2024: The Politics of Presidential Elections by Stephen Wayne

What It Takes: The Way to the White House by Richard Ben Cramer

Script and Presentation: Suhasini Haidar

Production: Gayatri Menon and Shibu Narayan

This combination of file pictures created on August 3, 2024 shows US Vice President and 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris speaking on March 26, 2024, in Raleigh, North Carolina; and former US President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaking in the first presidential debate with US President Joe Biden in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 27, 2024. ABC will host a presidential debate between Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris on September 10, the US television network confirmed on August 8.
“Vice President Harris and former President Trump have both confirmed they will attend,” the network said on X.
| Photo Credit: AFP

ABC says both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris have agreed to a September 10 presidential debate, setting up a face-off between the Republican and Democratic nominees.

The announcement on Thursday (August 8, 2024) came shortly after Trump told a news conference that he had proposed three presidential debates with three television networks, saying he agreed on certain dates in September.

Trump is rejoining the ABC debate days after posting on his social media network that he would not appear on the network, citing a lawsuit he has filed. His decision sets up a highly anticipated moment in an election where the first debate led to a massive change in the race — with Democratic President Joe Biden ending his reelection bid and endorsing Harris.

“I think it’s very important to have debates,” Trump said Thursday. “I look forward to the debates because I think we have to set the record straight.”

The Harris campaign had no immediate comment.

Trump had teased an announcement about the presidential debate earlier this week after pulling out of an ABC News debate scheduled for September 10 after President Joe Biden ended his reelection campaign. Trump had said he would prefer that Fox News sponsor the debate, but on Wednesday was showing willingness to reconsider ABC.

Trump also echoed criticism from his running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, that Harris has not held a news conference or sat down for interviews since Mr. Biden’s withdrawal last month and she entered the race.

Ms. Harris has a travelling press pool with her on Air Force Two for all trips. Trump does not have a set travelling press pool that regularly accompanies him on his plane when he goes out to campaign.

Mr. Vance has journalists flying with him, and he campaigned this week in states where Ms. Harris and Mr. Walz had their own events scheduled. That included on Wednesday, when Mr. Vance’s plane and Air Force Two ended up on the same tarmac in Wisconsin. Mr. Vance started walking toward the Democrats’ plane but did not reach it before a motorcade carrying Ms. Harris, Mr. Walz and the travelling press pulled away.

Washington:

Republican presidential nominee and former president Donald Trump has said that his campaign raised USD 139 million in July and has USD 327 million cash on hand.

“There has never been anything like the MAGA Movement. We raised $139 Million Dollars in July alone. We now have a whopping $327 Million Cash On Hand.” Trump said on Truth Social, his social media platform.

“Spectacular support from Great American Patriots who are donating to our Campaign for President of the United States, and helping out in many other ways. Much work to be done, but I will always keep fighting for YOU. Our Country is failing, but we will turn it around, quickly, and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!,” he said on Thursday.

The Trump Campaign, in a statement, said these numbers reflect continued momentum with donors at every level and provide the resources for the final 96 days until victory on November 5th.

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

Washington:

The 100-day sprint to the US election began Sunday, the final act of a campaign transformed by an assassination attempt and the stunning exit of President Joe Biden.

After weeks of infighting and despondency over Biden’s candidacy, Democrats have consolidated behind Vice President Kamala Harris, radically reshaping the race to November 5 that was fast becoming Republican nominee Donald Trump’s to lose.

Harris’s candidacy has clearly reinvigorated the Democratic campaign, which said Sunday it had raised $200 million — mostly from first-time donors — since Biden dropped out and endorsed his vice president a week ago.

A new Wall Street Journal poll showed Harris had closed Biden’s six-point deficit with Trump to just two points — well within the margin of error — with boosted support from Black, Latino and young voters.

But Republican pollster David Lee, who conducted the Journal survey, cautioned Democrats not to get carried away by the race tightening.

“Donald Trump is in a far better position in this election when compared to a similar time in the 2020 election,” Lee said.

If the race is at a dead heat nationally, the advantage still lies with Trump given the mathematics of the Electoral College system for electing the president.

Trump’s 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton came despite losing the country-wide popular vote by nearly three million ballots.

‘We are the underdogs’

“We are the underdogs in this race,” Harris acknowledged at a fundraising event on Saturday.

“But this is a people-powered campaign and we have momentum,” she added.

The Democratic convention in mid-August will seek to keep that momentum going with a jubilant celebration of Harris’s candidacy.

It all looked so different just a month ago.

Dogged by voters’ concerns about his age and mental acuity, the 81-year-old Biden was an outside bet at best, trailing his predecessor in the first presidential rematch since Dwight Eisenhower trounced Adlai Stevenson in 1956.

Biden’s dismal June 27 debate showing ignited alarm and panic within his party.

The flames were fanned by a flawless show of unity behind 78-year-old Trump at the Republican national convention — an event galvanized by the failed bid, just days earlier, to assassinate the former president at a rally in Pennsylvania.

After an initial show of defiance, Biden bowed to the inevitable and dropped out last weekend.

Harris, a generation younger at 59, threw her hat in the ring — turning what had been a stale contest between two unpopular, aging, white male candidates into a dynamic and unpredictable showdown.

The final result on November 5 will likely be determined by around 100,000 independent, undecided voters in a handful of battleground states that both campaigns will target exhaustively over the coming three months.

The Harris honeymoon

The challenge for Harris is substantial. Once the Republicans have adapted to her candidacy and honed their attack lines, they are set to hammer her over key voter issues such as immigration and rising prices.

Democratic strategist James Carville told MSNBC that Democrats needed to cut the happy talk and prepare for the coming storm.

“They’re coming at us and they’re going to keep coming. And this kind of giddy elation is not going to be very helpful much longer because that’s now what we’re going to be faced with,” he said.

Even former president Barack Obama has cautioned against hubris, underlining Harris’s underdog status and the need for her to earn the trust of voters.

Trump, who has seen his favorability ratings tick upward since the July 13 attempt on his life and the successful Republican convention, made his attack priorities clear at a rally Saturday in the traditionally Democratic state of Minnesota.

Labelling Harris a “crazy liberal” and a “radical left lunatic,” Trump lied to make her sound like an extremist on abortion and made fun of her laugh.

“We have a brand-new victim,” he told his cheering supporters.

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

Nearly two weeks after Donald Trump’s near assassination, the FBI confirmed on July 26 that it was indeed a bullet that struck the former President’s ear, moving to clear up conflicting accounts about what caused the former President’s injuries after a gunman opened fire at a Pennsylvania rally.

“What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whether whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject’s rifle,” the agency said in a statement.

The one-sentence statement from the FBI marked the most definitive law enforcement account of Trump’s injuries and followed ambiguous comments earlier in the week from Director Christopher Wray that appeared to cast doubt on whether Trump had actually been hit by a bullet.

The comment drew fury from Trump and his allies and further stoked conspiracy theories that have flourished on both sides of the political aisle amid a dearth of information following the July 13 attack.

Up until now, federal law enforcement agents involved in the investigation, including the FBI and Secret Service, had refused to provide information about what caused Trump’s injuries. Trump’s campaign has also declined to release medical records from the hospital where he was first treated or to make the doctors there available for questions.

Updates have instead come either from Trump himself or from Trump’s former White House doctor, Ronny Jackson, a staunch ally who now represents Texas in Congress. Though Jackson has been treating Trump since the night of the attack, he has come under considerable scrutiny and is not Trump’s primary care physician.

The FBI’s apparent reluctance to immediately vouch for the former President’s version of events has also raised fresh tension between the Republican nominee and the nation’s premier federal law enforcement agency, which he could soon exert control over once again. Trump and his supporters have for years accused federal law enforcement of being weaponized against him, something Wray has consistently denied.

Speaking at an event later Friday in West Palm Beach Florida, Trump drew boos from the crowd when he described the suggestion that he may have been struck by glass or shrapnel instead of a bullet.

“Did you see the FBI today apologized?” he asked. “It just never ends with these people. … We accept their apology.”

Trump appeared on July 26 for the first time without a bandage on his right ear. Photographs and video showed no sign of continued bleeding, and no distinct holes or gashes.

Questions about the extent and nature of Trump’s wound began immediately after the attack, as his campaign and law enforcement officials declined to answer questions about his condition or the treatment he received after Trump narrowly escaped death in an attempted assassination by a gunman with a high-powered rifle.

Those questions have persisted despite photographs showing the trace of a projectile speeding past Trump’s head as well as Trump’s teleprompter glass intact after the shooting, and the account Trump himself gave in a Truth Social post within hours of the shooting that he had been “shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear.”

“I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin,” he wrote.

Days later, in a speech accepting the nomination at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Trump recounted the scene in detail, while wearing a large gauze bandage over his right ear.

“I heard a loud whizzing sound and felt something hit me really, really hard, on my right ear. I said to myself, ‘Wow, what was that? It can only be a bullet,’” he said.

“If I had not moved my head at that very last instant,” Trump said, “the assassin’s bullet would have perfectly hit its mark, and I would not be here tonight.”

But the first medical account of Trump’s condition didn’t come until a full week after the shooting, when Jackson released his first letter last Saturday evening. In it, he said the bullet that struck Trump had “produced a 2 cm wide wound that extended down to the cartilaginous surface of the ear.” He also revealed Trump had received a CT scan at the hospital.

Federal law enforcement involved in the investigation, including the FBI and Secret Service, had declined to confirm that account. And Wray’s testimony offered apparently conflicting answers on the issue.

“There’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that hit his ear,” Wray said, before he seemed to suggest it was indeed a bullet.

“I don’t know whether that bullet, in addition to causing the grazing, could have also landed somewhere else,” he said.

On July 25, the FBI sought to clarify matters with a statement affirming that the shooting was an “attempted assassination of former President Trump which resulted in his injury, as well as the death of a heroic father and the injuries of several other victims.” The FBI also said Thursday that its Shooting Reconstruction Team continues to examine bullet fragments and other evidence from the scene.

Jackson, who has been treating the former President since the night of the July 13 shooting, told The Associated Press on July 25 that any suggestion Trump’s ear was bloodied by anything other than a bullet was reckless.

“It was a bullet wound,” said Jackson. “You can’t make statements like that. It leads to all these conspiracy theories.”

In his letter on July 26, Jackson insisted “there is absolutely no evidence” Trump was struck by anything other than a bullet and said it was “wrong and inappropriate to suggest anything else.”

He wrote that at Butler Memorial Hospital, where the GOP nominee was rushed after the shooting, he was evaluated and treated for a “Gunshot Wound to the Right Ear.”

“Having served as an Emergency Medicine physician for over 20 years in the United States Navy, including as a combat physician on the battlefield in Iraq,” he wrote, “I have treated many gunshot wounds in my career. 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 at nurses at Butler Memorial Hospital on the day of the shooting.”

The FBI declined to comment on the Jackson letters.

Asked if the campaign would release those hospital records, or allow the doctors who treated him there to speak, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung blasted the media for asking.

“The media has no shame in engaging in disgusting conspiracy theories,” he said. “The facts are the facts, and to question an abhorrent assassination attempt that ultimately cost a life and injured two others is beyond the pale.”

In emails last week, he told the AP that “medical readouts” had already been provided.

“It’s sad some people still don’t believe a shooting happened,” Cheung said, “even after one person was killed and others were injured.”

Anyone who believes the conspiracies, he added, “is either mentally deficient or willfully peddling falsehoods for political reasons.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a close Trump ally, also urged Wray to correct his testimony in a letter on July 26, saying the fact Trump had been hit by a bullet “was made clear in briefings my office received and should not be a point of contention.”

“As head of the FBI, you should not be creating confusion about such matters, as it further undercuts the agency’s credibility with millions of Americans,” he wrote.

Trump also lashed out at Wray in a post on his Truth Social network, saying it was “No wonder the once storied FBI has lost the confidence of America!”

“No, it was, unfortunately, a bullet that hit my ear, and hit it hard. There was no glass, there was no shrapnel,” he wrote.

On Friday, he called Wray’s comments “so damaging to the Great People that work in the FBI.”

Jackson has encountered significant scrutiny over the years.

After administering a physical to Trump in 2018, he drew headlines for suggesting that “if he had a healthier diet over the last 20 years, he might live to be 200 years old.”

He was reportedly demoted by the Navy after the Department of Defense inspector general released a scathing report on his conduct as a top White House physician that found Jackson had made “sexual and denigrating” comments about a female subordinates and took prescription-strength sleeping medication that prompted worries from his colleagues about his ability to provide proper medical care.

Trump appointed Wray as FBI director in 2017 to replace the fired James Comey. But the then-President swiftly soured on his hire as the bureau continued its investigation into the Russian election interference.

Trump flirted openly with the idea of firing Wray as his term drew to a close, and he lashed out anew after the FBI executed a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida to recover boxes of classified documents from his presidency.