‘I took a bullet for democracy,’ Trump tells first rally after shooting

Donald Trump, holding his first campaign rally Saturday since surviving an assassination attempt, dismissed concerns that he is a threat to democracy, triumphantly telling a cheering crowd stating, “Last week I took a bullet for democracy.”

“I’m not an extremist at all,” he continued at the rally in swing state of Michigan, dismissing his reported links to Project 2025, a radical shadow manifesto led by figures close to him that has been characterized by opponents as an authoritarian, right-wing wish list.

And he mocked the rival Democratic Party, roiled by unprecedented pressure for President Joe Biden to abandon the White House race amid concerns over his age and fitness to serve, if reelected, until 2029.

“They have no idea who their candidate is… This guy goes and he gets the votes, and now they want to take it away. That’s democracy,” Trump told the 12,000-strong crowd of passionate supporters.

Even as he veered into his typical, rambling campaign speech, the rally represented a moment remarkable by any measure, with Trump back on stage exactly one week since a gunman tried to kill him.

The Republican presidential nominee appeared wearing a new, smaller, flesh-colored bandage over his right ear, bloodied in the attack by a 20-year-old gunman at a rally in Pennsylvania that killed one bystander.

Security was reportedly tight inside the Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids, Michigan, amid questions over Secret Service lapses at the Pennsylvania rally — though there were few visible signs of any greater law enforcement presence.

Meanwhile, Biden loyalists continued to defend the embattled president as the drumbeat of calls for him to abandon his campaign grows louder.

The 81-year-old and his team have remained publicly adamant that he is staying in the race, though some reports suggest discussions have begun in his inner circle about how exactly he might step aside.