The woman who witnessed the assassination attempt against Trump

“When you’re a reporter, there’s always this understanding that you are chronicling a thread of history.” So says author and long-time New York Postcontributor Salena Zito, whose new book “Butler: The Untold Story of the Near Assassination of Donald Trump and the Fight for America’s Heartland” details her experience standing mere feet from President Trump when he was shot on July 13. Zito was hardly new to being in such close proximity to the president.A longtime chronicler of his unlikely political ascent, they enjoyed an unexpected camaraderie fueled by an affection for family.

“Salena, it’s so great to see you.How are you doing? How are all those grandkids?” Trump said to Zito just before he took that fateful Pennsylvania stage.

“I love my grandkids, too.I love being around them,” he concluded.Within minutes, in a typical Trumpian display of patriotism, country star Lee Greenwood was singing “God Bless the USA”; minutes after that, Thomas Matthew Crooks fired eight rounds at Trump, nearly killing the president and sparking nationwide shock and history-making.“I knew as soon as I heard those first shots, I had an obligation to be calm,” Zito says, “because what I was covering wasn’t just a tiny thread of modern history.

It was an event that was going to change everything.” Here, in an exclusive excerpt from “Butler,” Zito describes the day she stood alongside history in the making.——–I felt the velocity in the same split second that I heard the four gunshots.My eyes were fixated on [then] former president Donald Trump, who stood a mere few feet away from me on an outdoor stage in front of the podium.

It was July 13, 2024.I was in the buffer zone with my daughter, Shannon Venditti, and my son-in-law Michael.Shannon looked over at me and asked, “Why are there fireworks?” I knew they weren’t fireworks and, subconsciously, she did too.

We are gun owners.Shannon didn’t want to think this could be happening;...