Hello and welcome to the 538 politics podcast. I'm Gailen Druke.

By now I'm sure you're familiar with the details of the assassination attempt on former

President Donald Trump.

Trump was speaking at a rally in Butler County, Pennsylvania shortly after 6 p.m. on Saturday, when a shooter opened fire on him, barely missing his head and instead hitting his ear. Secret Service piled on top of him and he was taken away and confirmed safe.

One attendee was killed in the shooting and two others have been in critical condition.

The FBI is actively searching for the shooter's motive and what we know is still limited.

I'll just say up front, it's awful and upsetting and

violate so much of what the United States is supposed to be about.

It's sad on a human level, and it's also sad on a societal level and for what it's worth

It goes against the entire reason that we do this podcast which is that elections are how we sort out political differences.

We didn't want to rush into covering this attack without fuller details and we have some of those

now.

We've also gathered some information that hopefully can help contextualize what's happened and where we're headed.

Though I should say sometimes data is not the most important part of a story.

And I think I can say that what's most important now is what happens next and that the country manages to curtail any political violence.

With that said, today we're going to look at America's history with political violence, see what surveys can tell us about how

Americans view it, and track how lawmakers and leaders are responding to the violence.

So here with me to do that today is senior election analyst Nathaniel Raykich.

Hello Nathaniel.

Hey Galen.

Also here with us is senior researcher Mary Radcliffe.

Hello Mary.

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