The Jamestown native was in Butler, Pa., during the Trump rally as a freelance photographer.

“I was in front of the (former) President, at his 10 o’clock position,” Kosko said.

Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pa., opened fire on the rally from a nearby rooftop, killing one spectator, before he was shot dead by the Secret Service, The Associated Press reported.

In the wake of the shooting, The AP said, investigators were hunting for any clues about what may have drove Crooks, to carry out the shocking attack. The FBI said they were investigating it as a potential act of domestic terrorism, but the absence of a clear ideological motive by the man shot dead by the Secret Service led conspiracy theories to flourish.

A selfie of Paul Kosko, who was at the rally for former President Donald Trump, at a campaign event in Butler, Pa., on Saturday, July 13, 2024.

“I hit the dirt too, just like everybody else there. … One fellow that passed away, the 50-year-old volunteer firefighter, he got hit in the head. Two other people got hit in the stomach area,” Kosko said. “The shots rang out and went pop, pop, pop, pop, pop.”

Kosko said the crowd did not realize how serious the situation was and thought maybe the shots were firecrackers.

“When all this happened. The crowd just stood there. Do you know what I mean? We didn’t realize that it was what was happening. We were almost numb to what was happening,” Kosko said.

Kosko added that it wasn’t until Trump was whisked away by the Secret Service, that people started saying “we have to get out of here.”

“But it was almost like the whole crowd was frozen. … “We didn’t realize, as far as with the people that were shot, and one fatally, that had happened, because again, when you’re there, it sounded like firecrackers,” Kosko said.

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is helped off the stage by the Secret Service at a campaign event in Butler, Pa., on Saturday, July 13, 2024. Photos by Paul Kosko

He added that there were snipers on a roof behind Trump.

The FBI said it believes Crooks, who had bomb-making materials in the car he drove to the rally, acted alone, The AP said. Investigators have found no threatening comments on social media accounts or ideological positions that could help explain what led him to target Trump before the Secret Service rushed him off the stage, his face smeared with blood.

Trump said on social media the upper part of his right ear was pierced in the shooting, but advisers said he was “great spirits” ahead of his arrival Sunday in Milwaukee for the Republican National Convention. Two spectators were critically injured, while a former fire chief from the area, Corey Comperatore was killed. Pennsylvania’s governor said Comperatore, 50, died a hero by diving onto his family to protect them, The AP said.

“I’m a Trump supporter, but an American first. We’ve got to lower the temperature, with what’s going on as far as out there in the country,” Kosko said.