‘How did he know?’: Questions after second Trump assassination attempt
Donald Trump has escaped a second attempted assassination in two months, with one glaring question now being asked.
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Donald Trump has escaped a second attempted assassination in two months, with glaring questions now being asked about how a gunman was again able to get within a few hundred metres of the former President.
Secret Service shot at a man armed with a scoped AK-47-style rifle on Sunday afternoon after he was spotted pointing the barrel through the chain-link fence at the Trump International Golf Course in Florida, close to Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.
Mr Trump was 300 to 500 yards (275 to 460 metres) away on the fifth hole when shots rang out at about 1.30pm (3.30am AEST), according to police.
The Republican presidential nominee was quickly rushed to safety and was unharmed.
“This event was not on any kind of public schedule so it’s not clear how this alleged lone gunman knew the former President would be playing golf today and also what time,” Fox News reporter Lucas Tomlinson said on-air.
“How did this lone gunman know? Perhaps he followed the motorcade … but that is one of the big questions.”
Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent turned conservative podcast host, wrote that it “looks like it was an OTR (off-the-record) movement for President Trump”.
“Security is handled differently for OTR movements, and this policy may have to change moving forward,” he wrote on X.
“The Secret Service loses any element of surprise with an OTR movement with President Trump because he’s so recognisable, and his in-town schedule can be predictable.”
The FBI has taken the lead on the investigation, but Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis vowed the state would conduct its own separate inquiry.
“The people deserve the truth about the would-be assassin and how he was able to get within 500 yards of the former President and current GOP nominee,” he wrote on X.
House Republican conference chairwoman Elise Stefanik said in a statement that “God continues to watch over President Trump” and thanked “our hardworking law enforcement officers”.
“However, we must ask ourselves how an assassin was allowed to get this close to President Trump again?” she said.
“There continues to be a lack of answers for the horrific assassination attempt in Pennsylvania and we expect there to be a clear explanation of what happened today in Florida.”
The suspect, named by US media as 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh, fled the scene in a black Nissan but was arrested a short time later by local police on the I-95.
Police recovered the rifle from the bushes by the golf course.
Two backpacks containing ceramic tile and a GoPro were also hung on the fence “where he was intent on filming what was going on”, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw told reporters at a media conference with the FBI and Secret Service.
“The Secret Service agent that was on the course did a fantastic job,” he said.
“What they do is they have an agent that jumps one hole ahead of time towards where the President was at and he was able to spot this rifle barrel sticking out of the fence and immediately engaged that individual, at which time the individual took off.”
A source earlier told The Daily Mail the fifth and sixth hole was a “vulnerable” area as it is one of the parts of the course closest to the road and the undergrowth is cut back every summer.
“We are working closely with the FBI, Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and other law enforcement partners to investigate the details of today’s protective incident in Florida,” Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said in a statement.
Sheriff Bradshaw said the golf course would have been “surrounded” if Mr Trump had been the sitting president but the Secret Service was “limited” in the areas it was able to cover.
“The golf course is surrounded by shrubbery, so when somebody gets into the shrubbery, they’re pretty much out of sight,” he said.
“And at this level (of protection) that he is at right now, he’s not the sitting president. If he was, we would have had this entire golf course surrounded. But because he’s not, security is limited to the areas that the Secret Service deems possible.”
He added, “So, I would imagine that the next time he comes to the golf course, there’ll probably be a little bit more people around the perimeter. But the Secret Service did exactly what they should have done.”
It comes just over two months after Mr Trump was shot in the ear in an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania that left one man dead and two other attendees injured.
The Secret Service faced widespread criticism, and its director Kimberly Cheatle resigned over shocking failures at the July 13 rally in Butler that allowed 20-year-old gunman Thomas Matthew Crooks to get onto a rooftop 130 yards (119 metres) from the stage.
Routh, a former construction worker from Greensboro, North Carolina, who now lives in Hawaii, was previously convicted in 2002 of possessing a weapon of mass destruction, a reference to a fully automatic machine gun, after a three-hour standoff with police in Greensboro.
He often criticised Mr Trump on his social media accounts and was a staunch supporter of Ukraine, having travelled there in 2022 claiming to want to “fight and die”.
Routh’s son, Oran Routh, told The Daily Mail on Sunday his father hates Mr Trump “like every reasonable person does” but said he was “not a violent person”.
Earlier this year, Routh wrote on X that “DEMOCRACY is on the ballot and we cannot lose” — invoking the campaign claim made by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
After the first attempted assassination, the Secret Service had increased Mr Trump’s protective detail, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayokas said on July 15.
“I cannot discuss specifics of the protection or the enhancements made, as they involve sensitive tactics and procedures,” the DHS chief said at the time. “I can say, however, that personnel and other protective resources, technology, and capabilities have been added.”
The Secret Service had demanded that Mr Trump hold all future outdoor rallies from behind bulletproof glass.
The bipartisan House task force investigating the July 13 assassination attempt called for a briefing on the latest incident.
“The task force is monitoring this attempted assassination of former President Trump in West Palm Beach this afternoon,” the task force’s Republican chairman Mike Kelly and Democratic ranking member Jason Crow said in a joint statement.
“We have requested a briefing with the US Secret Service about what happened and how security responded. We are thankful that the former President was not harmed, but remain deeply concerned about political violence and condemn it in all of its forms.”
Secretary Mayorkas commended the Secret Service for its “quick action to pre-empt this apparent assassination attempt and protect the former President”.
“We condemn violence against public officials and candidates,” he said in a statement on X.
“DHS and the Secret Service are closely working with federal, state and local law enforcement partners to learn all of the facts surrounding this incident. The safety and security of Presidential candidates and other protectees is the highest priority for the Secret Service.”
President Biden condemned “political violence” and said he was “relieved that the former President is unharmed”.
“I have directed my team to continue to ensure that Secret Service has every resource, capability and protective measure necessary to ensure the former President’s continued safety,” Mr Biden said in a statement.
— with NY Post
Originally published as ‘How did he know?’: Questions after second Trump assassination attempt
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