Trump Rally Shooting Is a “Wake-Up Call” on Rhetoric and Social Media, Says Christian Conservative

Milwaukee: A shooting at Donald Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania is being investigated as an attempted assassination of the former president and presumptive Republican nominee, law enforcement officials say.

Trump called Sunday for unity and resilience as shocked leaders across the political divide reacted to the shooting.

The Secret Service said it killed the suspected shooter, who attacked from a rooftop of a nearby building outside the rally venue.

Tony Perkins, among the most influential Christian conservatives in the Republican Party, was preparing to mount a confrontation with convention planners over his disdain for how debate during the RNC’s platform committee was shut down on Monday, all but eliminating objections to the Trump campaign’s desire to soften language on abortion.

The attempted assassination changed all that, Perkins told The Associated Press after a prayer service in suburban Milwaukee Sunday evening.

“We live in a violent society. And we run the risk of becoming callous to it. And if we become callous to it, we’re going to have more of it,” Perkins said. “I’m hoping and praying it’s a wake-up call in many ways.”

“So, as a result, I’m stepping back from forcing the issue on the platform,” he added. “More divisiveness would not be healthy.”

Perkins called social media “a contagion” for toxic rhetoric passed along by people who do not feel that they’re heard by their government or leaders, and attributed the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol in part to the notion of overheated online rage.

“We need to stop,” he said.

And while thanking God during the service for Trump’s survival, Perkins told more than 100 in the Pewaukee church, “Lord, I believe that our nation is at such a volatile moment that yesterday could have torn this nation right in half.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by Republic and is published from a syndicated feed.)