Trump’s Road from Jan. 6 Back to the White House
When Donald Trump departed the White House in January 2021 at the end of his first presidential term, a return to the nation’s highest office seemed out of the question to many political observers.
Just two weeks prior, fueled by Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen, his supporters had attacked the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to block Congress’ certification of Joe Biden’s victory. The events of Jan. 6 were seen at the time as “universally terrible,” former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly, host of The Megyn Kelly Show, tells FRONTLINE in the new documentary Trump’s Comeback.
“The thought of him coming back to the presidency was not even remotely a possibility,” Kelly says in the documentary. “A total impossibility to everyone but Trump.”
The above video drawn from Trump’s Comeback explores how, in the years after Jan. 6, 2021, that “total impossibility” became reality — despite numerous legal and political challenges.
The full documentary premieres Jan. 21, the day after Trump’s second inauguration. It traces key moments across President Trump’s life and career, including the indictments and conviction that followed his first term — and how, in the words of The New York Times’ Peter Baker, “what would have destroyed any other politician’s career, seemed to only strengthen him and embolden him.”
As the above video recounts, after leaving office, Trump was found liable for sexual abuse. His company, the Trump Organization, was convicted of felony crimes including tax fraud. Trump himself was indicted four times: for his role in Jan. 6 and efforts to overturn the 2020 election, for his handling of classified documents, and for his involvement in a “hush money” scheme for which he was ultimately convicted on 34 felony counts.
“The day you’re being arraigned and fingerprinted and mug-shotted — for most people, that’s a bad day. But for Donald Trump, it was an opportunity,” Trump biographer Marc Fisher says in the video. “All of these raids, all of these prosecutions, only fed his presentation of himself as a victim, as a martyr, as someone who is there to take these bullets on behalf of Americans.”
Calling the trial that resulted in his May 2024 felony conviction “rigged” and “disgraceful,” Trump, who denied any wrongdoing in all of the cases against him, said, “The real verdict is gonna be November 5th by the people.”
Then, with his greatest comeback underway, came a defining moment for Trump: Surviving actual bullets when he was the target of an assassination attempt at a July 2024 campaign rally.
“The strength of your character and the fight within you is tested in moments like that,” Brooke Rollins, Trump’s pick for agriculture secretary in his new administration, says in the video.
Trump’s return to the White House was cemented that day, according to Hogan Gidley, a White House deputy press secretary during the first Trump administration.
“To watch that man stand up, raise his fist and look at the crowd and yell, ‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’ Gidley tells FRONTLINE. “In that moment I said, ‘He just won the election.’”
For the full story, watch Trump’s Comeback. The documentary draws on FRONTLINE’s vast archive of reporting on Trump across nearly a decade — including The Choice 2024, FRONTLINE’s dual biography of Trump and his Democratic opponent, Kamala Harris — as well as new interviews with White House insiders and journalists conducted after Trump’s 2024 election victory. As it investigates how Trump’s historic comeback had roots dating back decades, the documentary offers a valuable primer on his approach to life and politics as his second term begins.
Trump’s Comeback will be available to watch in full starting Jan. 21, 2025, at 10/9c. Watch on PBS stations (check local listings), at pbs.org/frontline, in the PBS App or FRONTLINE’s YouTube channel. The documentary will also be available on the PBS Documentaries Prime Video Channel. Trump’s Comeback is a FRONTLINE Production with Kirk Documentary Group, Ltd. The director is Michael Kirk. The producers are Michael Kirk, Mike Wiser and Vanessa Fica. The writers are Michael Kirk and Mike Wiser. The reporters are Vanessa Fica and Brooke Nelson Alexander. The editor-in-chief and executive producer of FRONTLINE is Raney Aronson-Rath.
