Being a president is more dangerous than bull-riding, Donald Trump said at his first town hall event since an apparent attempt on his life.
A suspect in a potential assassination attempt against Mr Trump at his golf club in West Palm Beach on Sunday has been charged with two federal gun crimes.
Speaking 48 hours after that incident at a town hall event in Flint, Michigan, where he took questions from supporters, he said being president is a “dangerous business”.
“This is a dangerous business… being president, it’s a little dangerous,” he said.
“They think race-car driving is dangerous, no, they think bull-riding – that’s pretty scary, right? No, this is a dangerous business.”
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Mr Trump was unhurt in the incident, with the FBI confirming suspect Ryan Routh, 58, fired no shots despite the Secret Service revealing he was a few hundred yards away.
The FBI says an investigation is in its “early stages”, with several questions remaining unanswered from the incident that comes just weeks after he was shot at during a Pennsylvania rally.
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“I have to say, Secret Service did a hell of a job, they really did,” Mr Trump said at the Michigan event.
“One of the agents was walking a couple of holes in front, and he saw a rifle, AK 47 – that’s serious stuff, right?”
He also praised a witness, who he said followed the suspect after he fled the scene.
“So the guy is now running for his life and he’s got a car about a block away or whatever… and a woman driving a car saw a man on the street running, she followed him and he got into the car and she stopped because she thought he was trouble,” he said.
“She followed him, it wasn’t very far and parked the car behind his car and started taking pictures of his licence plate.”
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He added: “If you took 1,000 of these incidents, would one person have done it?”
Mr Trump also said both President Joe Biden and his rival in the election vice-president Kamala Harris made “nice” calls following the incident.
