What are the origins of this fun-filled festive custom?
The March 30, 1981, shooting of Ronald Reagan is the nearest anyone has gotten to claiming the life of a sitting US president since the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. Reagan was leaving the Washington Hilton hotel when his attacker struck.
James A. Garfield, the 20th president of the United States, survived being shot for 11 weeks before succumbing to his wounds. The assassin struck on July 2, 1881, at the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad Station in Washington, D.C., less than four months after Garfield had taken office.
The assassination of William McKinley took place on September 6, 1901, at the Temple of Music in Buffalo, New York. The 25th president of the United States was attending the Pan-American Exposition when a man stepped out of the crowd and shot him twice in the abdomen. Mortally wounded, McKinley died eight days later.
The most infamous assassination of an American president took place on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. President John F. Kennedy was shot once in the back, the bullet exiting via his throat, and once in the head. He died shortly after arriving at the city's Parkland Memorial Hospital.
Theodore Roosevelt had a miraculous escape after an assassin's otherwise lethal bullet was impeded by a 50-page campaign speech folded over twice in Roosevelt's breast pocket and a metal glasses case that deflected the slug. Roosevelt, who had served as the 26th president of the United States, was campaigning in Milwaukee on October 14, 1912, as the Bull Moose candidate for the US presidency. He's pictured greeting supporters before the failed assassination attempt.
On January 30, 1835, Andrew Jackson, the seventh president of the United States, was leaving the Capitol building in Washington, D.C. when he was confronted by a man aiming a pistol at him, which misfired. The gunman then pulled out another pistol, which also misfired.
Taft and Díaz were attending a historic presidential summit in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, on October 16, 1909—the first time an American president had stepped over the US-Mexico border. Lurking among the crowds along the procession route was 52-year-old Julius Bergerson of Minnesota, holding a concealed palm pistol. Fortunately, two security personnel spotted Bergerson and quickly disarmed him. The failed assassin was later declared insane and spent the rest of his days in an asylum.
A plot to assassinate Herbert Hoover was uncovered in November 1928 as the president-elect embarked on a 10-nation "goodwill" tour of Central and South America. He's pictured with Chilean president Carlos Ibáñez del Campo.
The attempted assassination of Franklin D. Roosevelt took place on February 15, 1933, some 17 days before Roosevelt's first presidential inauguration. The president-elect was attending a rally at Bayfront Park in Miami (pictured) when shots rang out.
Roosevelt's would-be assassin was Italian immigrant Guiseppe Zangara. While he missed his principal target, Zangara did mortally wound Chicago mayor Anton Cermak and injured four other people. Zangara, pictured in jail reading newspaper accounts of the incident, was found guilty of Cermak's murder and executed in the electric chair on March 20, 1933.
Truman was ensconced in Blair House (pictured) while the White House was undergoing major renovations. In the attack, Torresola shot two policemen, mortally wounding one of them before being gunned down himself. Collazo was also shot, but survived. Truman was unharmed. Collazo was convicted of attempted murder and sentenced to death, though Truman later commuted this to life in prison. In 1979, President Jimmy Carter further commuted Collazo's sentence to time served.
On November 1, 1950, two Puerto Rican nationalists, Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola, attempted to take the life of Harry S. Truman, the 33rd president of the United States.
A plot to assassinate President Richard Nixon in Ottawa, Canada, was uncovered in 1972 after Milwaukee-born Arthur Bremer was identified as the would-be assassin—but only after he shot and wounded another high-profile American politician. Nixon is pictured with Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau.
Bremer had planned to attack Nixon as the president's motorcade drove past him, but Nixon's car was traveling too fast for him to get a good shot. A few weeks later, he instead shot and seriously injured the governor of Alabama, George Wallace (pictured), leaving him paralyzed for the rest of his life. Bremer served 35 years in prison for the shooting of Governor Wallace.
Nixon's successor, Gerald Ford, survived two attempts on his life in as many weeks. On September 5, 1975, the president was in Sacramento on the grounds of the California State Capitol when he reached out to shake the hand of a woman in the crowd. The woman drew a handgun and pulled the trigger, but the chamber was empty. Ford was immediately surrounded by a throng of secret servicemen and bundled out of harm's way.
The would-be assassin was Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, shown here leaving the courthouse after her first hearing on the charge of attempting to assassinate the president. Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson, served 34 years in prison for her crime.
Seventeen days later, President Ford was in San Francisco. As Ford was leaving the city's St. Francis Hotel, he waved to the crowd. At the same time, a single gun shot echoed off the surrounding buildings.
Ford's would-be assassin on this occasion was another woman, Sara Jane Moore. As she aimed towards Ford, a bystander grabbed her arm and the shot missed its target. Moore was given a life sentence for the assassination attempt and served 32 years behind bars before being released on parole.
Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the United States, was the target of what the authorities believed was an assassination plot. On May 5, 1979, an individual named Raymond Lee Harvey was arrested by Secret Service agents after being found carrying a starter pistol with blank rounds, shortly before Carter was to give a speech at the Civic Center Mall in Los Angeles.
Harvey had a history of mental illness, but police were compelled to investigate further after he claimed to be part of a four-man operation to assassinate the president at the mall (pictured). Harvey and another man, an illegal Mexican alien who gave the name Osvaldo Espinoza Ortiz, were arrested but later released due to lack of evidence. The names "Lee Harvey" and "Osvaldo" (Osvaldo is the Spanish equivalent to "Oswald") led conspiracy theorists to draw comparisons to Lee Harvey Oswald.
Lincoln's killer was John Wilkes Booth. His shooting of the president was part of a larger eight-man conspiracy to revive the Confederate cause. Booth was eventually tracked down and killed. Of the eight conspirators later convicted, four were quickly hanged.
Garfield's killer was Charles J. Guiteau, an delusional American who felt aggrieved for not having been recognized by the administration with a consulship, based either in Paris or Vienna. His frustration boiled over into murderous intent. Guiteau was sentenced to death for the crime and was hanged five months later.
McKinley's assassin was American laborer and anarchist Leon Czolgosz. At his trial, the gunman pleaded insanity, but was nonetheless found guilty of murder. Czolgosz's last words before his execution were_ "I shot the president because I thought it would help the working people and for the sake of the common people. I am not sorry for my crime."
One day after Kennedy's death, Lee Harvey Oswald, the man accused of carrying out the assassination, was himself shot and killed, gunned own by Jack Ruby. Harvey remains the man most likely to have murdered Kennedy, though conspiracy theorists to this day claim he was just one man in a much wider plot to kill the president.
Sources: (Time) (The New York Times) (National Archives) (The White House) (Yesterday's America)
See also: The biggest scandals of Donald Trump's political career
The man who fired the gun was John Flammang Schrank, a Bavarian-born saloonkeeper from New York. Schrank had stalked Roosevelt through eight states in an effort to catch the right moment to kill him. The would-be assassin was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and committed to an institution for the criminally insane, where he lived until his death in 1943.
The would-be assassin was later identified as John Hinckley Jr. Hinckley fired six shots towards the president, striking him and three others. After his arrest, Hinckley said he had wanted to kill Reagan to impress actress Jodie Foster. Though seriously wounded, Reagan recovered quickly. His shooter, meanwhile, served 35 years in jail before being released from institutional psychiatric care in 2016.
The would-be assassin was later named as Richard Lawrence, an English-American house painter. Lawrence was ultimately found not guilty by reason of insanity and spent the remainder of his life in insane asylums. He was the first known person to attempt the assassination of a sitting president of the United States.
William Howard Taft, the chosen successor of Theodore Roosevelt and the 27th president of the United States, was meeting the president of Mexico, Porfirio Díaz, when he became the target of an assassin.
A group of Argentine anarchists led by Severino Di Giovanni planned to blow up Hoover's train as it crossed the country's central lowlands. Fortunately, the plot was uncovered before the bombers could place the explosives on the rails. Severino Di Giovanni was later executed by firing squad on February 1, 1931, as an enemy of the state.
Former president and current Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump narrowly avoided death at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13. The controversial political figure was addressing the crowd when suddenly several shots rang out and he raised his hand to his ear. Within seconds, a group of Secret Service agents had dived onto Trump and brought him to the ground for protection. Their rapid-fire coms could be heard through Trump's microphone as they planned the former president's safe exit from the stage, but within a minute, they were heard confirming, "Shooter's down." The agents then rose and helped Trump down from the stage, his fist in the air and blood on his face. While Trump survived the assassination attempt with only a minor wound to the ear, a man attending the rally was fatally shot, and two more were critically injured. What's more, the would-be assassin was shot dead by Secret Service agents at the scene. He was later identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks.
While Ronald Reagan was very fortunate to have survived the assassination attempt on him, four other US presidents weren't so lucky. Abraham Lincoln has the dubious honor of being the first chief executive of the federal government to be killed by an assassin. He was shot and mortally wounded on April 14, 1865. He died the following day.
Since America's founding in 1776, four US presidents have been assassinated while in office. But assassination attempts and plots on White House incumbents are numerous. In fact, there have been at least 17 serious attempts to murder a president in the country’s history. So, who are those that dodged a bullet, and who are those that didn't?
Donald Trump famously escaped with a minor ear wound when 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks took a shot at him during a rally on July 13, 2024. On September 15, Trump was playing golf on his course in West Palm Beach, Florida, when 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh was found in the bushes, taking aim at a member of his security team. Now, it seems there may have been a third attempt on Trump's life on October 12. Trump was holding a rally in Coachella, California, on Saturday when local cops stopped a 49-year-old man named Vem Miller from entering the event. He was stopped at a police checkpoint with a fake press pass in an unregistered car. When police searched the vehicle, they found several fake passports and driver's licenses, along with a shotgun and a handgun. He was arrested on weapons charges but got out on US$5,000 bail. The local sheriff, Chad Bianco, told reporters that he believed his department had prevented a third assassination attempt. However, the Secret Service and FBI seem to disagree. "The US Secret Service assesses that the incident did not impact protective operations and former President Trump was not in any danger," said a joint statement from the two federal agencies.
Click through the gallery to learn more about the attempts on Trump's life and the other presidents who became targets of assassins throughout history.
US presidents who survived assassination attempts (and four who didn't)
The attempts on the lives of White House incumbents are numerous
LIFESTYLE Trump
Since America's founding in 1776, four US presidents have been assassinated while in office. But assassination attempts and plots on White House incumbents are numerous. In fact, there have been at least 17 serious attempts to murder a president in the country’s history. So, who are those that dodged a bullet, and who are those that didn't?
Donald Trump famously escaped with a minor ear wound when 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks took a shot at him during a rally on July 13, 2024. On September 15, Trump was playing golf on his course in West Palm Beach, Florida, when 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh was found in the bushes, taking aim at a member of his security team. Now, it seems there may have been a third attempt on Trump's life on October 12. Trump was holding a rally in Coachella, California, on Saturday when local cops stopped a 49-year-old man named Vem Miller from entering the event. He was stopped at a police checkpoint with a fake press pass in an unregistered car. When police searched the vehicle, they found several fake passports and driver's licenses, along with a shotgun and a handgun. He was arrested on weapons charges but got out on US$5,000 bail. The local sheriff, Chad Bianco, told reporters that he believed his department had prevented a third assassination attempt. However, the Secret Service and FBI seem to disagree. "The US Secret Service assesses that the incident did not impact protective operations and former President Trump was not in any danger," said a joint statement from the two federal agencies.
Click through the gallery to learn more about the attempts on Trump's life and the other presidents who became targets of assassins throughout history.