Long before the assassination attempt on President Trump, violence was rampant at all levels of American politics.

BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Long before he became an assassin Shot and injured Former President Donald TrumpThe fuse of political violence was burning across America.

A member of Congress was shot. A Virginia congressman’s staff member Attacked With a baseball bat. In Louisville, A bullet grazed him The mayor’s sweater was stolen after someone broke into his campaign office. Tracking Device A bomb was planted in the mayor of Reno’s car. South Carolina officials received death threats over a solar panel factory. Outside Buffalo, a man threw an imitation pipe bomb into the window of a county clerk candidate’s home while his family was asleep. “If you don’t drop out of this race, I’ll put a real one next time,” the message read.

“I have people who come up to me and say, ‘I thought about running for town office, but I didn’t because I couldn’t imagine my family going through what you went through,'” said Melissa Hartman, who was the target of the pipe bomb attack and served as Eden’s town mayor before running for county clerk.

of Trump assassination attempt was Latest This is the most shocking example of political violence and harassment that is occurring regularly across the United States, undermining the foundations of our democracy and raising serious concerns. Election Day The shooting comes close. President Trump and President Joe Biden each called for unity after the shooting. The president told the nation“We must not allow violence to become normalized.”

Bitter partisanship, sometimes violent, has long been a part of American politics. In 1798, members of Congress from opposing parties got into a brawl. In the U.S. House of Representatives, They hit each other with sticks and fire tongs. Assassins have killed four presidents and injured or targeted other presidents and candidates, but the attack on Trump evoked more recent events.

Democratic U.S. Congresswoman Gabby Giffords He was wounded in a shooting outside a grocery store in Arizona in 2011. Republican U.S. Representative Steve ScaliseHouse Majority Leader John McCain was shot while practicing for a charity baseball game in 2017. Michigan’s Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, Kidnapping plot thwarted It was discovered in 2020.

Since then January 6, 2021 Riots Political violence continued after the riots at the U.S. Capitol shocked the world.

Man hit with a hammer husband In 2022, a man with a history of mental illness went to the Fairfax, Virginia, district office of Representative Gerry Connolly in San Francisco, the home of then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and attempted to kill him with a baseball bat. Attacked two employees.

And there are plenty of stories from lesser-known politicians like Hartman.

She lost her bid for county clerk and hasn’t run for office since in the town of 7,700 that’s home to North America’s only metal kazoo factory. The man who threw the imitation pipe bomb pleaded guilty; Hartman said he was paid by a neighbor to do it, and that two years later he still gets scared when people approach him in public.

In York County, South Carolina, a fast-growing suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina, County Council Chairwoman Christy Cox said she felt compelled to speak out about a letter she recently received after the assassination attempt on Trump. Cox sent her three children to retrieve the letter and have them read it while they were nearby. It was a death threat if she didn’t block a solar panel manufacturer from building a $150 million factory with tax incentives approved by Congress. Cox is a Republican, but another letter arrived at her county office threatening the county council’s lone Democrat.

“Our country is in a very dangerous and dark place right now, and I feel like some of that is spilling over into our communities,” she told Congress on Monday night. “The level of anger, hatred, lies, blame and fear-mongering is pervasive.”

In Reno, Nevada, the far-right movement has targeted local politicians, and Mayor Hillary Schieb says she doesn’t know if anyone from the movement has placed a tracking device on her car, so she avoids going out alone in public.

“I think people really forget that we’re human beings,” she said.

In 2022, a man broke into Mayor Craig Greenberg’s campaign headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky, and opened fire, grazing the mayor’s sweater. No staff members were hurt.

“Nothing good came from Saturday’s heinous act,” Greenberg said Monday, “but let’s hope this finally serves as a wake-up call.”

Michigan Senator Jeremy Moss called the assassination attempt a “reset” moment. Moss, who is Jewish and gay, used social media to Life-threatening Jewish Michigan public servant.

“I hope this will be a moment where we can all say that the bullet that missed President Trump saved us all, regardless of our political stance,” Moss said.

The attack came a day after governors at a meeting of the National Governors Association in Salt Lake City pledged to work together on public service announcements and other campaigns to show voters they can get along with their political opponents.

“We can resolve our differences without hating each other,” said outgoing chairman Spencer Cox, a Republican from Utah.

Calming the political climate will require both a change in messaging from the top and a willingness among ordinary voters to approach people who disagree with them, said Austin Doctor of the National Center for Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology and Education.

“It takes a lot of hard work and a consistent commitment to democratic values,” Doctor said. “The question we have to keep asking is, how do we get out of this potential vicious cycle?”

In Oklahoma, pollster and Republican consultant Pat McPheron said cross-party closed primaries in safe districts encourage candidates to use extreme rhetoric. A single open primary, he argued, would tamp down on that.

“Most of the candidates I know are people who, deep down, want to make a difference and who like a consensus-seeking environment,” McFarron said. “If you want to be successful, you have to play the game that’s in front of you.”

Republicans include the vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance — quickly criticized Biden and other Democrats for portraying Trump as a threat to democracy. Alabama’s Republican lieutenant governor, Will Ainsworth, took to Facebook to blame the “radical left” and said his policies attack Christianity and are “evil incarnate.”

Social media has emboldened intimidation: A 2021 survey of 112 public employees by the National League of Cities found that the overwhelming majority — about four in five — had experienced harassment, threats or violence. Most said it happened through social media, and more than half said it also happened at public meetings.

The threat of violence also increased It began with public health officials imposing restrictions during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. Ohio’s state health commissioner resigned after armed protesters stormed his home. California’s Orange County health official resigned after weeks of criticism and threats over mandating face coverings in public places.

And Trump’s False Narratives Rumors that the 2020 election was stolen have led to threats against local election officials and have caused misery and anxiety for some people. To quit. Many people are closely watching the upcoming election.

“It’s hard to imagine that there isn’t an election jurisdiction in the country that’s not on high alert right now about the possibility of political violence in the 2024 election,” said David Levine, a former local elections official in Idaho.

____ Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas, Mulvihill from Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and Collins from Columbia, South Carolina. Associated Press writers Christina Almeida Cassidy in Atlanta, Matthew Barakat in Springfield, Virginia, Bill Barrow in Milwaukee, Joey Cappelletti in Lansing, Michigan, Dylan Loban in Louisville, Kentucky, Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City and Gabe Stern in Carson City, Nevada, contributed.