Metro Atlantans shared varying views on Monday about whether the weekend’s assassination attempt on former President Donald J. Trump will impact whether he or President Joe Biden prevails in November.
But a common theme emerged in more than a dozen interviews with residents across the metro area: The political climate has reached an unacceptable boiling point, and voters are bracing for a tense few months leading up to the November presidential election.
News of the attempt on Trump’s life Saturday was troubling for Democrat Mia Davis, 52. The Atlanta native said she’s not a fan of Trump but agrees with Biden’s call to reject political violence. Davis said that neither the shooting nor the negative tenor of this campaign season will stop her from voting.
“It’s not verbal now,” Davis said. “It’s become physical and that’s not good.”
East Atlanta resident James Whyte, 50, a registered Democrat who voted in the last election, was at home cooking dinner when he saw the shooting news alert. Whyte says he still plans to vote for Biden, but he’s concerned about the safety at future campaign events.
“It does heighten my sense of fear,” Whyte says. “I hope that there’s not a situation where there will be retaliation.”
Eduardo Delgado, 64, who lives in Miami but is visiting family in Marietta, said he already planned to vote for Trump this fall. He thinks Saturday’s shooting might shift undecided voters in the former president’s direction.
Delgado defended Second Amendment rights following the shooting, saying people have the right to feel protected. He emphasized the fact that the shooter acted as an individual.
Chainee Woods, 32, decided early on that he would be voting for Trump. The political climate now, however, has made him hesitant to choose either candidate.
“Right now it’s a little crazy,” said Woods, who was out walking Monday at Colony Square in Midtown.
Chad Hoffecker, who also was out at Colony Square, believes today’s political climate is too intense. It has become more about party affiliation than ideas, he said.
“We’ve stopped listening to each other,” Hoffecker, 52, said, adding that he is secure in his vote for Biden.
Tom Bonnar, a 76-year-old Marietta resident, called Saturday’s attempt on Trump’s life “horrific” and “incredibly disappointing,” adding that the current political culture is like nothing he’s seen before.
“This is just very bad for the country right now,” Bonnar said. “And I’d like to say it culminated with what happened on Saturday, but I’m afraid it’s not going to, not right away. We’ve got a very tough two or three months ahead of us.”
“I think rhetoric on both sides got people worked up, and when you use the kind of language the candidates have been using, that is very attractive for fringe groups.”
Yet Bonnar doubts the impact will significantly sway voters as a whole.
“What you’re ending up with is two geriatric candidates,” Bonnar said. “And that is a huge complaint from a lot of people.”
Credit: NATRICE MILLER
Credit: NATRICE MILLER
Some younger voters say they’re still trying to make sense of what happened. Tina Lu, 23, says she tends to vote Democrat in elections. She was surprised to learn just how young the alleged shooter was.
“I think people can be very emotion driven, especially young people,” she says.
Lu, too, says something like Saturday’s violence felt inevitable given the campaign climate.
“It just highlights how abysmal the current election year is, how dark it seems, I think for everyone,” she says.
— Staff writer Dawn Sawyer contributed to this story.
