Former WH physician Ronny Jackson updates public on Trump's ear injury

An assassination attempt at a campaign rally last Saturday evening left millions of former President Donald Trump's supporters stunned and concerned about the well-being of the man they hope will return to the White House.

After several days passed without the release of a great deal of information about the status of Trump's injury or the medical treatment he received, former White House physician and current Congressman Ronny Jackson issued a memo explaining precisely where things stand, as the Associated Press reports.

Jackson releases update

The detailed report from Jackson offered the most insight to date into the harm Trump sustained the prior weekend, when a gunman opened fired and killed one spectator and seriously injured two others.

Jackson explained that he met with Trump on the night of the incident and had assessed and treated his wound each day since, noting that he is currently “doing well.”

The lawmaker wrote that the bullet that struck Trump came “less than a quarter of an inch from entering his head and struck the top of his right ear. The bullet track produced a 2 cm wide wound that extended down to the cartilaginous surface of the ear.”

According to Jackson, the wound initially produced “significant bleeding, followed by marked swelling of the entire upper ear,” though he noted that Trump's swelling “has since resolve, and the wound is beginning to granulate and heal properly.”

Adding a personal touch to the communication, Jackson thanked the staff at Butler Memorial Hospital in Pennsylvania for its initial handling of the president's injury and declared that it was “an absolute miracle he wasn't killed.”

False theories debunked

Though Jackson's memo clearly conveyed the seriousness of Trump's injury and danger the incident truly posed to the former president's life, there were rumblings from some corners of the Internet suggesting that he had not been shot at all and had concocted the entire story to garner voter sympathy.

ABC News noted that a claim began circulating online that included a photo purporting to reveal that Trump's right injury did not sustain any injury in the rally incident.

“The top part of his ear grew back,” one post on X sarcastically declared in a caption of the aforementioned photo, with another user stating, “This image of Trump was taken today. There is absolutely nothing wrong with his ear, and it has zero damage, FROM A BULLET. Everything about Trump is a con or a grift.”

However, the network, to its credit, underscored the fact that the image at issue was actually taken during a rally that occurred in September of 2022, and therefore had no relevance to the harm suffered by Trump over the weekend.

Fortunately, this time around, even a mainstream outlet like ABC News took pains to discredit disgraceful attempts from those working hard to downplay what was a truly horrifying incident marked by unfathomable failures by the very federal agency charged with protecting the former -- and perhaps future -- president.