OPINION — Much has been written about the peculiarly disturbing strain of political assassinations in American history. From Lincoln and Garfield to McKinley and Kennedy, it’s a sad and bloody path.
There are also the near misses. Since the first recorded assassination attempt on Andrew Jackson in 1835, there has been a string of close calls, including Harry Truman in 1950, Gerald Ford twice in 1975, and Ronald Reagan in 1981. Two ex-presidents were shot while running to reclaim their old job — Theodore Roosevelt in 1912 and Donald Trump in 2024 — and Franklin Roosevelt was inches away from a would-be assassin’s bullet as president-elect in 1933.
Of the 45 men who’ve served as president, 11 — almost one in four — were targeted. It is, quite literally, a high-risk job.
