- Gary O'Donoghue
- Senior North America correspondent BBC (10 years)
But amid the fear and anger, there was profound sorrow. People who were loyal Trump supporters, committed gun owners, wondered out loud to me about the way America was going. It was as if they could no longer recognise the country they lived in – as if everything had become strange and foreign.
…and in this gun-loving country, even those committed to their handguns and rifles in this rural part of Western Pennsylvania seemed sickened and worried about the randomness of the violence they witnessed
America has been spiralling towards this moment for years – a political culture that is not just adversarial but downright poisonous. People here – or should I say some people here – find it easy to hate their political opponents – it’s visceral; it’s become part of the nation’s DNA to hate.
And it’s not just political. You can see it in the divisions between the coasts and the centre. Between the north and the south; between the cities and rural America – everything being defined in terms of not being something or someone else.
Others expressed their anger in more political ways.
One man approached me and simply said: “They shot first. This is fucking war.”
Another just yelled “civil war” as he passed behind me.
And a few minutes later a huge electronic billboard appeared on the side of a truck – Donald Trump’s face framed in a target – the words simply read “Democrats attempted assassination - President Trump”.
It sent a shiver right up my spine – and the horror of the potential consequences of this act started to sink in.
Moments in history can only really be judged in retrospect. But I’ll take a guess that last night will go down as one of those moments. The question for the leaders of public opinion in this country is what will they now choose to do – to inflame or to calm. To further divide or to reunite.
As an outsider but someone who truly loves this nation, I’m not hopeful.
