Butler : Former US President Donald Trump on Saturday returned for a campaign rally to Pennsylvania town where he survived an assassination attempt this July.
He was joined on stage by head of Tesla and SpaceX who previously backed the Democrats but for this election is endorsing Trump. Wearing a "Occupy Mars" shirt and a black "Make America Great Again" baseball cap, Elon Musk quipped, "As you can see, I'm not just MAGA, I'm dark MAGA," the billionaire entrepreneur said.
"Fight! Fight! Fight!" Musk told the crowd repeating the same words that Trump uttered after a gunman tried to kill the former president at a campaign rally in Butler on July 13 this year.
"President Trump must win to preserve the Constitution," said Musk who is among the major contributors to the Republican Party's presidential campaign. At Saturday's rally he told the audience that the upcomig November elections were the "most important election in our lifetime and that Trump "must win to preserve democracy in America."
He further warned about how "Democrats want to take away your right to vote."
"The true test of someone's character is how they behave under fire and we had one president who couldn't climb a flight of stairs, and another who was fist-pumping after getting shot," Musk said in a swipe at US President Joe Biden.
Meanwhile, Trump recalled the July assassination attempt saying, "I will never quit. I will never bend. I will never break. I will never yield, not even in the face of death itself."
Trump asked for his supporters to hold a moment of silence marking the minute shots were fired at him at the previous Butler rally. The gunman, 20-year-old Thomas Crooks, was shot and killed by law enforcement on site. One rallygoer was killed and two others were injured.
Further in his speech, he attacked Democratic leaders for the federal response to Hurricane Helene, which has battered western North Carolina as well as parts of Tennessee, South Carolina and Georgia. Trump's running mate JD Vance was also at Saturday's rally.
"On this field at this exact spot, nearly three months ago, we thought President Trump was going to lose his life. But God still has a plan for him, just like he still has a plan for the United States of America," Vance said.