List of United States presidential assassination attempts and plots

There have been multiple assassination attempts on presidents of the United States; there have been 90 attempts to kill sitting and former presidents as well as presidents-elect. Four attempts on sitting presidents have succeeded: Abraham Lincoln (the 16th president), James A. Garfield (the 20th president), William McKinley (the 25th president) and John F. Kennedy (the 35th president). Two other presidents were injured in attempted assassinations: then-former president Theodore Roosevelt and then-sitting president Ronald Reagan.

Assassinations

Abraham Lincoln

Main article: Abraham Lincoln assassination

The Abraham Lincoln assassination took place on Good Friday, April 14, 1865 at approximately 10:15 p.m. President Abraham Lincoln was shot by actor and Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth while attending a performance of Our American Cousin at Ford's Theatre with his wife and two guests. Lincoln died the following day—April 15, 1865—at 7:22 a.m., in the home of William Petersen.

James A. Garfield

Main article: James A. Garfield assassination

The James A. Garfield assassination took place in Washington, D.C., at 9:30 a.m. on July 2, 1881, less than four months after Garfield took office. Charles J. Guiteau was the assassin. Garfield died 11 weeks later, on September 19, 1881 due to infections caused by substandard medical care.

William McKinley

Main article: William McKinley assassination

The assassination of William McKinley took place on September 6, 1901, at the Temple of Music, in Buffalo, New York. President William McKinley, attending the Pan-American Exposition, was shot twice by Leon Czolgosz, an anarchist. McKinley died eight days later, on September 14.

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Attempted assassinations

Andrew Jackson

Illustration of Jackson's attempted assassination

January 30, 1835: At the Capitol Building, a house painter named Richard Lawrence aimed two flintlock pistols at the President, but both misfired, one of them while Lawrence stood within 13 feet (4 m) of Jackson and the other at point-blank range. Lawrence was apprehended after Jackson beat him down with a cane. Lawrence was found not guilty by reason of insanity and confined to a mental institution until his death in 1861.

Abraham Lincoln

Main article: Baltimore Plot

February 23, 1861: The Baltimore Plot was an alleged conspiracy to assassinate President-elect Abraham Lincoln en route to his inauguration. Allan Pinkerton, eponymous founder of the Pinkerton National Detective Agency played a key role by managing Lincoln's security throughout the journey. Though scholars debate whether or not the threat was real, clearly Lincoln and his advisors believed that there was a threat and took actions to ensure his safe passage through Baltimore.

Theodore Roosevelt

October 13, 1912: Three and a half years after he left office, Roosevelt was running for President as a member of the Progressive Party. In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, John F. Schrank, a saloon-keeper from New York, shot Roosevelt once with a .38 caliber revolver. A 50-page speech folded over twice in Roosevelt's breast pocket and a metal glasses case slowed the bullet. Amidst the commotion, Roosevelt yelled out "Quiet! I've been shot." Roosevelt insisted on giving his speech with the bullet still lodged inside him. He later went to the hospital, but the bullet was never removed. Roosevelt, remembering that William McKinley died after operations to remove his bullet, chose to have his remain. Schrank said that McKinley's ghost had told him to avenge his assassination. Schrank was found legally insane and was institutionalized until his death in 1943.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

February 15, 1933 (one month before being sworn in for his first term in office): In Miami, Florida, Giuseppe Zangara fired five shots at Roosevelt. Four people were wounded and Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak was killed. Zangara was found guilty of murder and was executed March 20, 1933. Some researchers believe Cermak, not Roosevelt, was the intended target that day, as the mayor was a staunch foe of Al Capone's Chicago mob organization.

Harry S. Truman

Main article: Truman assassination attempt

In 1950, two Puerto Rican pro-independence activists attempted to kill Truman, resulting in the murder of one White House police officer and the death of one assassin; Truman was not harmed.

John F. Kennedy

December 11, 1960

December 11, 1960: While vacationing in Palm Beach, Florida, President-elect John F. Kennedy's life was threatened by Richard Paul Pavlick, a 73-year-old former postal worker. Pavlick's plan was to serve as a suicide bomber by crashing his dynamite-laden 1950 Buick into Kennedy's vehicle, but the plan was disrupted when Pavlick saw Kennedy's wife and daughter bidding him goodbye. That attack of conscience foiled the opportunity, with Pavlick's arrest by the Secret Service coming three days later after he was stopped for a driving violation, with the dynamite still in his car. Pavlick spent the next six years in both federal prison and mental institutions before being released in December 1966.

April 2, 1961

April 2, 1961: A reinforced security guard was in evidence as President and Mrs. Kennedy attended Easter service in Palm Beach, Florida. A week-old report had said the church would be the scene of an attempt by pro-Castro Cubans to assassinate the President and his family or to kidnap his three-year-old daughter Caroline.

Richard Nixon

February 22, 1974

February 22, 1974: Samuel Byck apparently planned to kill Nixon by crashing a commercial airliner into the White House. Once on the plane, he was informed that it could not take off with the wheel blocks still in place. He shot the pilot and copilot before killing himself. The events surrounding this assassination attempt were portrayed in the film The Assassination of Richard Nixon.

Gerald Ford

September 5, 1975

September 5, 1975: In Sacramento, California, Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson, drew a Colt .45 caliber pistol on Ford when he reached to shake her hand in a crowd. There were four cartridges in the pistol's magazine but the firing chamber was empty. She was soon restrained by a Secret Service agent. Fromme was sentenced to life in prison.

September 22, 1975

September 22, 1975: In San Francisco, California, Sara Jane Moore fired a revolver at Ford from 40 feet (12 m) away. A bystander, Oliver Sipple, grabbed Moore's arm and the shot missed Ford. Moore was sentenced to life in prison. She was later paroled on Monday, December 31, 2007, from a federal prison after serving more than 30 years.

Jimmy Carter

May 5, 1979: Two minutes before Carter was about to speak at the civic center mall in Los Angeles, Raymond Lee Harvey was arrested carrying a pistol. He later told authorities that he and another man, Osvaldo Ortiz, were hired to create a diversion so that Mexican hit men armed with sniper rifles could kill Carter. Charges against him were dismissed for lack of evidence.

Ronald Reagan

Main article: Reagan assassination attempt

On March 30, 1981, following a speaking engagement at the Hilton Washington Hotel in Washington, D.C., Reagan and three others were shot and wounded by John Hinckley, Jr. as Reagan was returning to his limousine. He survived and recovered after emergency surgery at nearby George Washington University Hospital.

George H. W. Bush

April 13, 1993: Sixteen men, in the alleged employment of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, smuggled a car bomb into Kuwait with the intent of killing Bush as he spoke at Kuwait University. The plot was foiled when Kuwaiti officials found the bomb and arrested the suspected assassins. Bush had left office in January 1993. On June 26, 1993, the U.S. launched a missile attack targeting Baghdad intelligence headquarters in retaliation for the attempted attack against Bush. The Iraqi Intelligence Service, particularly Directorate 14, was accused of being behind the plot.

Bill Clinton

September 12, 1994

September 12, 1994: Frank Eugene Corder flew a single engine Cessna into the White House lawn, apparently trying to hit the White House. The President and First Family were not home at the time. Corder was the only casualty.

October 29, 1994

October 29, 1994: Francisco Martin Duran fired at least 29 shots with a semi-automatic rifle at the White House from a fence overlooking the north lawn, thinking that Clinton was among the men in dark suits standing there (Clinton was in the White House Residence watching a football game). A tourist named Harry Rakosky tackled Duran before he could injure anyone. Duran was found to have a suicide note in his pocket and was sentenced to 40 years in prison.

George W. Bush

February 7, 2001

February 7, 2001: While President George W. Bush was occupied in the White House Residence, Washington, DC, Robert Pickett, standing outside the perimeter fence, discharged a number of shots from a weapon in the direction of the White House. The U.S. Park Police claimed, according to CNN correspondent Eileen O'Connor, that the type of handgun that was confiscated was of a sophisticated type and had the shooter not been shooting from an obstructed angle view, the bullets would have reached the White House. However, numerous trees and bushes separated the sidewalk, where Pickett was, from the White House. Following a stand-off of about ten minutes, the incident ended when a Secret Service officer shot Pickett, resulting in an injury which required immediate hospital surgery. Pickett was found to have emotional problems and employment grievances. Although Pickett had written letters to the President about these grievances there was lack of conclusive evidence that President Bush was a personal target. A court in July 2001 sentenced Pickett to three years imprisonment in connection with the incident.

September 11, 2001

On the morning of 9/11, President George W. Bush was at the Colony Beach and Tennis Resort on Longboat Key, Florida. He woke up around 6:00 AM and prepared for his morning jog. A van occupied by men of Middle Eastern descent arrived at the Colony Beach Resort and claimed they had a "poolside" interview with the President. They did not have an appointment and were turned away. It is possible this was an assassination attempt modeled on the one used on anti-Taliban fighter and Northern Alliance military leader Ahmed Massoud two days earlier. The previous April, Massoud addressed the European Parliament and warned of the possibility of al-Qaeda attacking in the West. Longboat Key Fire Marshal Carroll Mooneyhan was reported to have overheard the conversation between the men and the Secret Service, but he later denied the report. The newspaper that reported this, the Longboat Observer, stands by its story. Both Mooneyhan and the Observer reporter were questioned by the Secret Service, but the agency has not commented further. Witnesses have recalled seeing 9/11 hijacker ringleader Mohamed Atta in the Longboat Key Holiday Inn a short distance from where Bush was staying as recently as September 7, the day Bush’s Sarasota appearance was publicly announced.

May 10, 2005

May 10, 2005: While President George W. Bush was giving a speech in the Freedom Square in Tbilisi, Georgia, Vladimir Arutyunian threw a live Soviet-made RGD-5 hand grenade towards the podium where he was standing and where Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili and their two wives and officials were seated. The grenade was live and had its pin pulled, but did not explode because a red tartan handkerchief wrapped tightly around the grenade kept the firing pin from deploying quickly enough. Arutyunian was arrested in July 2005, and killed an Interior Ministry agent while resisting arrest. He was convicted in January 2006, and was given a life sentence.

Presidential deaths rumored to be assassinations

Zachary Taylor

On July 4, 1850, President Zachary Taylor was diagnosed by his physicians with chlamydia, a term that included diarrhea and dysentery but not true cholera. Cholera, typhoid fever, and food poisoning have all been indicated as the source of the president's ultimately fatal gastroenteritis. More specifically, a hasty snack of iced milk, cold cherries and pickled cucumbers consumed at an Independence Day celebration might have been the culprit. By July 9, Taylor was dead.

In the late 1980s, author Clara Rising theorized that Taylor was murdered by poison and was able to convince Taylor's closest living relative, as well as the Jefferson Co., KY Coroner, Dr. Richard Greathouse, to order an exhumation. On June 17, 1991 Taylor's remains were exhumed from the vault at the Zachary Taylor National Cemetery, in Louisville, KY. The remains were then transported to the Office of the Kentucky Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. George Nichols. Nichols, joined by Dr. William Maples, a forensic anthropologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, removed the top of the lead coffin liner to reveal remarkably well preserved human remains that were immediately recognizable as those of President Taylor. Radiological studies were conducted of the remains before small samples of hair, fingernail and other tissues were removed. Thomas Secoy of the Department of Veterans Affairs (and a direct descendant of Taylor's Democratic presidential opponent Lewis Cass), ensured that only those samples required for testing were removed and that the coffin was resealed. The remains were then returned to the cemetery and received appropriate honors at reinterment. The samples were sent to Oak Ridge National Laboratory, where neutron activation analysis revealed traces of arsenic at levels less than one one-hundredth of the level expected in a death by poisoning.

Warren G. Harding

In June 1923, President Warren G. Harding set out on a cross-country "Voyage of Understanding," planning to meet ordinary people and explain his policies. During this trip, he became the first president to visit Alaska. Rumors of corruption in his administration were beginning to circulate in Washington by this time, and Harding was profoundly shocked by a long message he received while in Alaska, apparently detailing illegal activities previously unknown to him. At the end of July, while traveling south from Alaska through British Columbia, he developed what was thought to be a severe case of food poisoning. He gave the final speech of his life to a large crowd at the University of Washington Stadium (now Husky Stadium) at the University of Washington campus in Seattle, Washington. A scheduled speech in Portland, Oregon was canceled. The President's train proceeded south to San Francisco. Upon arriving at the Palace Hotel, he developed pneumonia. Harding died of either a heart attack or a stroke at 7:35 p.m. on August 2, 1923. The formal announcement, printed in the New York Times of that day, stated that "A stroke of apoplexy was the cause of death." He had been ill exactly one week.

Naval physicians surmised that he had suffered a heart attack; however, this diagnosis was not made by U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Charles E. Sawyer, who was traveling with the presidential party. Mrs. Harding refused permission for an autopsy, which soon led to speculation that the President had been the victim of a plot, possibly carried out by his wife. Harding apparently had been unfaithful to the First Lady. Gaston B. Means, an amateur historian and gadfly, noted in his book The Strange Death of President Harding (1930) that the circumstances surrounding his death lent themselves to some suspecting he had been poisoned. Several individuals attached to him, personally and politically, would have welcomed Harding's death, as they would have been disgraced in association by Means' assertion of Harding's "imminent impeachment." Although Means was later discredited for publicly accusing Mrs. Harding of the purported murder, enough doubts surround the President's death to keep reputable scholars open to the possibility of foul play.

In Popular Culture

Presidential assassinations and attempts have been referenced in popular culture in many ways. Stephen Sondheim wrote the musical Assassins based on all four successful presidential assassins, and several unsuccessful ones (Zangara, Hinckley, Byck, Fromme and Moore). Stephen King's novel The Dead Zone, which culminates with the main character's attempted assassination of a presidential candidate, spawned both a film and a television series. The film JFK presents a dramatic version of the investigation of Kennedy's assassination. These are just some examples.