‘We are not enemies:’ Biden gives forceful Oval Office address following Trump assassination attempt

President Joe Biden forcefully condemned the assassination attempt of Donald Trump in a rare Oval Office address on Sunday evening, saying it was time to “lower the temperature” of politics as the country heads into the final months until Election Day.

“I want to speak tonight about the need to lower the temperature in our politics and to remember, though we may disagree, we are not enemies,” Biden said, speaking behind the Resolute Desk. “We are neighbors, friends, co-workers, citizens. Most importantly: we are fellow Americans.”

Biden spoke to the nationafter a shooter opened a fire on Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania shortly after 6pm on Saturday. Trump was injured but survived, and was rushed from the stage by security, bleeding from his right ear.

A rally-goer, 50-year-old Corey Comperatore, was killed while he was trying to shield fellow attendees.

Biden spoke of him by name during his address. “Corey was a husband, a father, a volunteer firefighter, a hero, sheltering his family from those bullets,” he said.

The shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, was killed by law enforcement. Biden said the shooting required Americans to take stock of the current political landscape.

“We stand for an America, not of extremism and fury, but of decency and grace,” he said.

Biden sought to link Trump’s assassination attempt with other recent violence in US politics: a shooting at a practice for the Congressional Baseball Game that severely injured House Majority Leader Steve Scalise; the riot at the US Capitol on January 6; the assault on the husband of former House speaker Nancy Pelosi; and the kidnapping attempt of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer.

“There's no place in America this kind of violence, for any