Doug Mills, a photojournalist with The New York Times (NYT), has won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography for his extraordinary image capturing the moment a bullet grazed Donald Trump’s head during an assassination attempt—shot with a standard camera at 1/8000 second, a rare feat in press photography.
The Pulitzer Prize Board announced winners across 24 categories on May 5, spanning reporting, publishing, and the arts.
Mills took the iconic photo on July 13, 2024, during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a bullet fired at then-Republican presidential candidate Trump flew narrowly past his head. The NYT image clearly shows the bullet’s trajectory just behind Trump’s head.
Despite multiple gunshots ringing out, Mills continued to shoot, using a Sony digital camera capable of 30 frames per second. The now-famous frame was captured at a shutter speed of 1/8000 second, freezing the instant the bullet sped by.
Michael Harrigan, a former FBI agent, explained that a bullet can travel about 0.4 feet (12.2 cm) during the brief moment the shutter is open at that speed—highlighting the technical difficulty of the shot. While bullets in motion are typically captured using high-speed specialist cameras, Mills managed it with standard press equipment, making the photo even more remarkable.
The NYT also secured four additional Pulitzer Prizes this year, including for an investigative report on how U.S.-backed militias in Afghanistan committed civilian massacres, fueling Taliban support. This achievement made the NYT the most-awarded outlet in 2025.
The prestigious Public Service Pulitzer went to nonprofit investigative outlet ProPublica, honored for exposing how strict anti-abortion laws in some U.S. states led medical staff to delay or deny emergency care to pregnant women, resulting in fatalities.
The Washington Post won the Breaking News Reporting Pulitzer for its swift and in-depth coverage of the attempted Trump assassination in July 2024.
BY HYOUNGKU KIM from Washington, D.C.
