On March 30, 1981, Ronald Reagan, the president of the United States, was shot and wounded by John Hinckley Jr. outside of the Washington Hilton in Washington, D.C., as Reagan was returning to his limousine after a speaking engagement at the hotel. Hinckley believed the attack would impress the actress Jodie Foster, with whom he had developed an erotomanic obsession after viewing her in the 1976 film Taxi Driver.

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