The most surprising thing about the shot that was aimed at Donald Trump but killed one of his supporters is not the attack itself. Although it is deeply terrifying that a presidential candidate (or anyone) is shot, on the one hand the scene is nothing new in the democracy of the United States, sadly full of assassins of presidents or aspiring assassins of presidents. On the other hand, Trump is not a conventional candidate, but one who uses hatred as a political instrument, who defends the use of weapons, who utters the most violent phrases about the most vulnerable, who lies about almost everything, who denies global warming, who did not accept defeat at the polls and encouraged the assault on the Capitol where five people died and more than 140 police officers were injured. That Trump at some point had a shot as a response is regrettable, but not surprising. The most intriguing thing about the attack is what comes next.
Donald Trump’s first reaction is to repeat: “Let me get my shoes.” Four times. The officers want to take him to the car, remind him that he is covered in blood, but a minute after almost being killed, he is only thinking about his shoes. Trump asks them to wait and then forges the image that could lead him to victory: face partially bloodied, fist raised, he repeats: “Fight, fight, fight.” Trump becomes the classic American hero and the crowd responds in unison: “USA, USA, USA”.
After nearly being assassinated as a man, Trump is back to life as campaign manager. And he throws at least one clue into the mystery of the shoes. The insistent phrase may indicate that he has a horror of being exposed in socks, carried by younger, stronger men (and with shoes). In socks, Trump would be more fragile than his rival Joe Biden, so often the target of accusations of senility in recent weeks. From John Wayne to Rocky Balboa, Hollywood has never seen a hero in socks.
But Trump recovered in record time from the politically lethal risk of humanization and forged the image that could win him the election. Don’t look at my feet, look at my face. And everyone looked at it, photographed it, recorded it and printed it on the cover of the Times and the press around the world.
The black shoe was left on the red carpet. The shoe without a man. And soon after, ads for T-shirts with a bloody fist and the phrase appeared on Elon Musk’s X: Let me get my shoes. T-shirts on a strong, young, tattooed male body. No face, because the face that completes the image can only be Trump’s. And, of course, the stamp: Made in USA. A song with the title is already circulating on YouTube. let me get my shoes.
It is difficult to know what the first words of a man who has almost been assassinated mean. In the case of Trump, whose greatest truth is that he is a liar, we will never know. What we do know is that, with or without shoes, after the attack we have less and less ground under our feet.
The shot did not hit Trump, but it did hit humanity. The most notorious destroyer of democracy, when he becomes a victim, is treated like a democrat. The greatest sower of hatred and division now preaches unity (around himself). The worst politician in the history of the United States is anointed with the aura of the martyr who claims that his survival is a miracle. We already saw it in the Brazil of Jair Bolsonaro, stabbed during his first presidential campaign. And we know what happened afterwards. But Brazil is not the United States. And, next to Trump, Bolsonaro is the apprentice.
God save us from America.
