(AFP) – Donald Trump’s former physician said Saturday that the Republican presidential candidate sustained a two-centimeter (almost one inch) gunshot wound during last week’s attempted assassination, but that his ear is starting to heal.
The memo from former White House physician Ronny Jackson, now a hardline right-wing lawmaker from Texas, is one of the first detailed accounts of the injury Trump sustained when a young gunman opened fire at a rally in Pennsylvania one week ago, killing one bystander and wounding two others.
“The bullet passed, coming less than a quarter of an inch from entering his head, and struck the top of his right ear,” wrote Jackson, who said he flew to see Trump in New Jersey late on the evening of the rally, and had been treating his ear ever since.
“The bullet track produced a 2cm wide wound that extended down to the cartilaginous surface of the ear. There was initially significant bleeding, following by a marked swelling of the entire upper ear,” he continued.
The swelling has since gone down, and the wound “is beginning to granulate and heal properly,” he wrote in the memo, published by Trump on his Truth Social network.
There is still some bleeding requiring a bandage, but “given the broad and blunt nature of the wound itself, no sutures were required,” Jackson wrote. Trump also underwent a CT scan of his head as he was treated for the wound by doctors at the hospital in Butler, Pennsylvania, he said. “He will have further evaluations, including a comprehensive hearing exam, as needed,” Jackson said.
Jackson, who retired from the Navy as a rear admiral last year, was first appointed to the White House medical unit under former president George W. Bush, then became the president’s doctor in 2013, under Barack Obama.
But he gained national fame after effusively praising Trump’s health and “great genes” in 2018, declaring: “I told the president that if he had a healthier diet over the last 20 years, he might live to be 200 years old.”
Soon after, Trump nominated him to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs, but Jackson withdrew his name from consideration following allegations he had improperly handed out drugs and was sometimes drunk at work.
During his campaign for Congress, Jackson positioned himself as a close Trump supporter, endorsing the narrative that Obama had “weaponized” the government to spy on Trump.
He also broke ranks with public health officials on the coronavirus, saying that mask wearing should be a “personal choice,” and he questioned Joe Biden’s cognitive capacity to run for president.
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