The implications of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump over the weekend remain unclear. Will it lead him to strike a more conciliatory tone during the upcoming Republican National Convention? Will it make more Americans sympathize with him?

And then there are the questions of what led to the shooting. Why did this individual try to kill Trump? These questions were intensified by the news that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is investigating the incident as domestic terrorism.

It is too early to conclusively determine why this happened–and we may never know as the shooter is dead–but we can discuss what evidence we would need to conclude it was terrorism.

What is terrorism?

As I discussed in another post here in response to another shooting in the United States, while there is debate over the nature of terrorism we do have useful definitions. A common one is Bruce Hoffman’s, which defines terrorism as the “deliberate creation of fear through violence or the threat of violence in pursuit of political change.” So it must be planned and political, with an intended audience beyond the proximate target of the violence.

Ideological inclinations are not the same thing as an ideological platform

Of course, we want to know what the FBI investigation will lead to, which requires understanding its definition of terrorism. The FBI distinguishes between domestic and international terrorism. Domestic terrorism, which this would fall under, is violent acts intended to coerce a population or lead to policy changes; targeting government officials for assassination is explicitly included in this definition.

Was this terrorism?

This suggests the attack on Trump could be terrorism if there was a political motive behind it. That is, if the shooter wanted to kill Trump to remove him from politics, or scare his supporters away, that would be terrorism.

It’s hard to tell now. There were reports that the shooter was anti-Republican or antifa but these are false. Some right-wing figures–like Marjorie Taylor Green–claimed it was an attack on Trump because Democrats support pedophiles (I’ll leave someone else to figure that out). The shooter was wearing merchandise from Demolition Ranch, a guns-focused Youtube site, leading some to conclude the shooter had a gun fixation. I’ve also seen some people share the shooter’s purported instagram account, which contained references to Jeffrey Epstein; in response, some have said this was a planned attack on Trump over his ties to Epstein. I haven’t seen any verification of those posts, however.

If this were an act of terrorism it would be a worrying sign for the state of American democracy.

Of course, ideological inclinations are not the same thing as an ideological platform. If it turns out that the shooter had right-wing views, that may suggest a motive but isn’t enough to conclude he did this for political reasons. What we would really need is some kind of manifesto, or public and private writings indicating a desire to effect political change through violence.

As of now, it’s looking likely this was more similar to school shootings, in which an isolated individual lashes out. Sometimes this is to gain attention, other times it is just to punish. The shooter’s classmates report he was a loner who was often bullied. This would fit the idea of a non-ideological attack.

It may be useful to look at other successful and attempted assassinations of US Presidents to determine this. Some I would argue count as terrorism, such as the assassination of President McKinley by an anarchist. Others were political but motivated more by grudges; Charles Guiteau killed President Garfield as he felt passed over for a political position. And still others had little political element, such as the attempted assassination of Reagan by a man who hoped to impress Jodie Foster.

Does it matter?

As always, it’s worth asking whether it matters if this was terrorism. Obviously the shooter is dead, so it won’t affect how he is prosecuted. But it could matter in other ways.

The first is what this means about the state of political violence in the United States.

While fears of a civil war have not yet come to pass, there have been a disturbing number of attacks against elected officials in recent years. This includes the 2011 shooting of Democratic Congresswoman Gabby Giffords and the 2017 shooting of Republican Congressman Steve Scalise. Both shooters had antagonistic political views towards their targets, although only the latter was charged with terrorism.

The United States is also experiencing a surge of right-wing political violence. This includes the January 6th attack on the US Capitol, as well as earlier attacks such as that on a Pittsburgh synagogue and a supermarket in a black neighborhood of Buffalo. I have argued we need to call this terrorism, both for reasons of consistency and to get ahead of a possible incipient right-wing terrorist campaign. Understanding where this attack falls on the ideological spectrum would contribute to this.

If this were an act of terrorism it would be a worrying sign for the state of American democracy. At this point, I would say it’s more likely this was right-wing than left-wing terrorism, however. That would suggest offshoots of right-wing ideology are going after people seen as “on their side,” which is just as worrying as inter-ideological fighting.

Beyond that, it is worth thinking about how the government would treat the shooter if he had been taken alive.

As many have pointed out, there is no federal law against domestic terrorism; federal laws only criminalize international terrorism. So, for example, the Oklahoma City bomber was executed on charges of murder and conspiracy. There are state laws against terrorism, which New York used against the Buffalo shooter. But the lack of a coherent federal framework could be an issue as seen with attempts to prosecute the January 6th attackers.

A better understanding of what led to the attack on Trump could contribute to debates over how best to criminalize domestic terrorism. Some want explicit laws against domestic terrorism as the current US approach favors right-wing extremists–who tend not to have international connections (yet)–and is harsher on Islamists who are usually connected to some international movement. Others, however, worry that giving the government more power to go after domestic opponents would not be a good thing.

I want to close by discussing the ethics of this discussion. While I do not think this looks like terrorism right now, that doesn’t mean it is not serious. I made a similar argument about the 2022 Colorado nightclub shooting, that it was a hate crime but not terrorism. In response, some attacked me on Twitter for downplaying the attack because it involved LGBTQ people. Terrorism is one type of political violence among many. Rather than stretching the definition to include all political violence we should adopt a stricter definition to aid in investigation and analysis.

UPDATE: I accidentally wrote the US is “encouraging” right-wing extremism, I meant to say “experiencing”