Newly-released video is showing what led up to a confrontation in Nob Hill Saturday afternoon.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – As our country grapples with Saturday’s near miss – hours before a lone shooter took aim at the former president – Trump’s name was at the center of a violent encounter outside an ice cream shop in Albuquerque.
Newly-released video is showing what led up to a confrontation in Nob Hill Saturday afternoon.
“The incident started with some individuals who had some anti-Trump signs in the back of their truck. They told officers that they’re used to kind of political discourse or confrontations that tend to get, you know, in their words, pretty nasty, and it sounds like that’s what’s happening in this case,” said APD Public Information Officer Gilbert Gallegos.
Police say this tense moment happened before the assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump.
“We’re really fortunate that nobody got shot and seriously injured in this incident,” said Gallegos.
Video from the APD Real Time Crime Center shows the black SUV ram into the truck where two men are holding anti-Trump signs. That’s when one man in the truck pulled out a gun and pointed it at the driver.
Witness video shows men in a truck bed arguing with the driver of the black SUV before he returns to ram the truck.
Police say he threw a bottle at the people in the truck before getting maced.
“That’s the problem with these incidents, there’s political discourse, I think, on both sides of these issues that have really gotten out of control,” Gallegos said.
After the assassination attempt on Trump, local law enforcement joined the calls to take the temperature down.
” I’m sure law enforcement agencies across the country are, you know, on high alert for just the simplest of disagreements in any case. But when you get this political division where people, it’s almost like they’re daring another group or another side to confront them and engage in violent activity,” said Gallegos. “It raised it to another level because of what happened in Pennsylvania and, you know, I think we’re all on edge a little bit.”
Police looking for the driver of the black SUV as they say this politically-driven fight narrowly avoided tragedy.