The images filled television screens across a troubled country on a warm Saturday night: Former President Donald Trump clutching his bloodied ear as he walked to the floor of a stage at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania and U.S. Secret Service agents rush to surround him.
Although the video was readily available and replayed dozens of times, its meaning was not so clear. And viewers watched the painstaking process of reporters rushing to fill in the gaps in a political assassination attempt.
“It really is a very, very scary moment in American history,” CNN’s Wolf Blitzer said.
News and broadcast networks began extensive coverage within moments — once it was clear that something terrible had happened. What unfolded was a textbook example of the ultimate test for journalists as a major story unfolds: trying to get reliable information as quickly as possible, while being careful not to speculate, get too excited, or spread unsubstantiated rumors.
When The Associated Press issued its first alert about the news at 6:16 p.m. Eastern Time, it stuck strictly to what it saw: “Donald Trump escorted off stage at rally by Secret Service after loud noises were heard in crowd.” Similarly, The New York Times described in its first words how Trump was rushed off stage “after pops that sounded like gunfire were heard.”
In other words, don’t assume something that seems obvious at first glance.
In the opening minutes, CNN and others relied on former Secret Service agents to describe how the Pennsylvania security unit responded. They reviewed audio from the scene and told viewers that the fact that Trump was taken off the stage was a sign that they believed the immediate threat had passed.
“When a president or a presidential figure faces an assassination attempt, the country is on edge,” said CBS News’ Robert Costa.
NBC News’ Lester Holt and reporter Tom Winter showed just how careful they had to be in this situation, telling viewers that their source had reported that the alleged shooter had been killed.
The information, Winter said, indicated that investigators could begin their work to identify the shooter and try to determine a motive. Asked by Holt about the likelihood that a second shooter was involved, Winter said that’s not often the case — but he was careful not to prejudge what was already known.
“There’s a lot of information, a lot of things are changing,” Winter said.
One passage on CBS showed the competing impulses felt in a pressurized situation. “We’re very cautious” about what we can report, network anchor Adriana Diaz said. That was immediately followed by a colleague relaying an eyewitness account of “a man who was shot on the ground with brain tissue.”
While the video played continuously (in some cases with annotations so viewers could clearly see what was said afterward), the networks also showed still images, which were often even more impressive.
Reporters on several networks interviewed people at the meeting to find out what they saw and what their impressions were. At least one interviewee was honest about her sources.
When a Fox News reporter asked her if she had seen blood on the former president, the person replied, “I spoke to ABC News and they said that there was.”
___
David Bauder writes about media for the AP. Follow him on http://twitter.com/dbauder.