Jim Copenhaver, one of three rallygoers struck by gunfire during the July 2024 assassination attempt on President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, has died at 76, a loss House Republicans confirmed Thursday with a call for prayers.
Copenhaver never fully recovered from the wounds he sustained that day. A bullet hit him in the triceps. Another tore through his colon and lodged inside his body, leaving him with permanent nerve damage. He endured multiple surgeries over the two years that followed, Fox News reported, but the fragments and the pain never left him.
His death adds a second fatality to the toll from the Butler Farm Show grounds, where a gunman opened fire on July 13, 2024, grazing Trump's ear and sending a crowd of thousands scrambling for cover. Corey Comperatore, a 50-year-old volunteer fire chief, was killed instantly while shielding his wife and daughter from the bullets. A third victim, David Dutch, was shot in the chest and liver but survived.
House Republican leadership posted a statement on X Thursday confirming Copenhaver's passing. Just the News reported the full text of the statement:
"We are deeply saddened by the passing of Jim Copenhaver, who was gravely wounded in the horrific shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania. Jim endured unimaginable hardship with strength and perseverance. We join his family and loved ones in mourning his loss and praying for them during this difficult time. May he rest in peace."
Mayor Jondavid Longo of Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania, offered a blunter account of what Copenhaver's final two years looked like. Fox News quoted Longo saying Copenhaver "survived that day, but he never fully recovered from the wounds. For two years he lived with surgeries, remaining fragments, and pain that never left him."
Copenhaver, from Coraopolis, Pennsylvania, had been discharged from Allegheny General Hospital roughly one week after the shooting. His family released a statement at the time thanking first responders, medics, and hospital staff. Breitbart reported that Dutch was also released from the same hospital after treatment for his chest and liver wounds.
The threats surrounding the Trump family and those in the president's orbit have not subsided since Butler. An armed man arrested at a Trump golf course was found carrying notebooks with the first lady's schedule and Secret Service details, a reminder that the security risks extend well beyond a single rally.
The July 13 attack drew intense scrutiny of the Secret Service's performance that day. A subsequent Senate investigation concluded that the assassination attempt was "foreseeable" and "preventable," citing failures in the agency's security planning. Dutch, the other surviving victim, placed the blame squarely on the protective detail.
The New York Post reported Dutch's assessment in October 2024:
"I believe there was 100% negligence on the Secret Service, probably everybody involved in setting that security."
The shooter was killed by countersnipers after firing several rounds from a position that security personnel had failed to secure. Senate documents later revealed that an anonymous donor covered the cremation costs for the gunman, a detail that drew its own wave of public anger.
Comperatore's sacrifice became a symbol of the day's horror and heroism. His firefighter uniform was displayed at the Republican National Convention days after the shooting, and Trump kissed Comperatore's helmet in tribute. The Washington Examiner reported that Comperatore, a former fire chief, died shielding his family from the gunman's rounds.
Trump himself survived by inches. The president later said he was "supposed to be dead," a reflection of how close the bullet came to striking him fatally rather than grazing his ear. The assassination attempt reshaped security protocols for the entire first family, with Barron Trump now living inside a security bubble shaped by Iranian threats and the Butler shooting itself.
What sets Copenhaver's death apart from Comperatore's is the duration of his suffering. Comperatore died in seconds, acting on instinct to protect his family. Copenhaver lived, but he lived with bullet fragments still inside him, with a colon torn apart by a round fired at a political rally, and with nerve damage that no surgery could fully repair.
He was 74 when the shooting happened. He was 76 when he died. The information provided does not specify whether his death was officially classified as a direct result of his injuries, but the trajectory is plain enough: a man shot at a rally spent his final two years in and out of operating rooms, carrying shrapnel, and managing pain that, as the Slippery Rock mayor put it, "never left him."
The broader pattern of political violence and its consequences continues to shadow public life. First family dynamics now unfold against a backdrop of persistent threats, and the human cost of the Butler shooting has only grown with time.
Dutch's current condition has not been publicly detailed. Whether he, too, carries lasting damage from that July afternoon remains an open question.
Jim Copenhaver went to a rally. He left in an ambulance. He spent two years paying for someone else's failure to secure the perimeter, and now his family is left to bury him. That is the cost, and no Senate report can give it back.
