Clionadh Raleigh on Trump assassination attempt at Correspondents Dinner

Prof. Clionadh Raleigh, Founder and CEO of ACLED, said:

“This is no longer an isolated incident — repeated, credible assassination attempts against a US president point to a broader escalation in political violence. The US is facing a particularly volatile mix: widespread access to firearms, persistent lone-actor threats, and an increasingly hyper-radicalised political culture.

“What is especially concerning is how normalised extreme rhetoric has become. In the early days of the Iran war, even mainstream conversations included casual references to assassinating political leaders — not fringe commentary, but language entering everyday discourse. That shift matters. It lowers the threshold for violence and reinforces a climate where these acts become more normal.

“Disorder in the US is decentralised, opportunistic, and difficult to predict. And the risk extends across the political spectrum, to anyone in public office.”