Following his survival of an assassination attempt in July during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, Donald Trump told a Fox News presenter that he believes God believes he will "straighten out" the country.

“I think you think like, if you believe in God, you believe in God more. And somebody said like, why? And I’d like to think that God thinks that I’m going to straighten out our country,” Trump told Mark Levin on Life, Liberty & Levin after the host asked him if the shooting on 13 July had strengthened his belief in the almighty.

In an attempt to win reelection to the White House, the former US president and current Republican presidential contender has been trying harder in recent months to galvanise his religious base and some of its most radical components, such Christian nationalists.

Trump has said in the past that the fact that Matthew Crook's gunshot only just missed his ear was the result of divine intervention. He said to reporters shortly after the incident, "I'm not supposed to be here." It's supposed that I'm dead.

“By luck or by God, many people are saying it’s by God I’m still here,” he said.

During his Fox News interview, Trump pivoted to floating God’s political purpose for his survival. “Our country is so sick and it’s so broken. Our country is just broken. And maybe that was the reason, I don’t know. I don’t know, a lot of people have said that.”

For evidence, he cited the view of his sons, both hunters, who had told him, he said, “there was no chance that he (Crooks) could have missed from that distance”. He added that he thought the shooter, who had been spotted by rallygoers, “was probably rushed”.

Trump praised his Secret Service detail, which has come under intense criticism for failing to stop Crooks before he took up position on a rooftop less than 300ft away from the stage and fired off eight shots, killing one and seriously wounding two others.

“Obviously, somebody should have been on top of that roof. And there was some problems. But I have to tell you – Secret Service. They were on top of me and they were bullets were flying over us–and there wasn’t one of them that said, ‘Oh gee, I’m not doing that,’” Trump said.

The former US president’s invocation of a divine purpose comes as his former commerce secretary Wilbur Ross publicly warned him against being too “big and strong” in his upcoming debate against Vice-President Kamala Harris on 10 September.

“The only danger is Trump being big and strong and a man,” Ross told radio host John Catsimatidis over the weekend. “He has to be careful not to be seen as piling on a woman. People don’t like to see a woman pushed too hard,” Ross said.

During his term in the White House, Trump advisers frequently went on TV to express opinions that they wanted the president to consider. Ross said the debate should not be about theatrics but rather about “real topics” like inflation, foreign affairs, and the country’s southern border.

“I think he needs to smoke her out as to what her positions are on those topics and subject them to real debate,” Ross said. “I think if he sticks to those issues, I think he’ll do just fine.”