 "Who is Ryan Wesley Routh, the suspected gunman in Donald Trump’s second assassination attempt?")
A game of golf turned almost deadly for Donald Trump on Sunday when a gunman fired at the former US president at his Mar-a-Lago resort home in Florida. This shooting, which the Federal Bureau of Investigation termed to be “an attempted assassination of the former president”, comes just two months after a previous attempt was made in Pennsylvania on July 13.
Shortly after the shooting, Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, said in an email to his supporters, “There were gunshots in my vicinity, but before rumours start spiralling out of control, I wanted you to hear this first: I AM SAFE AND WELL!.” He added, “Nothing will slow me down. I will NEVER SURRENDER!”
Reacting to the incident, the White House said that President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were relieved to know that Trump is safe. “Violence has no place in America,” Harris said in a social media post. Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz also issued a statement, posting on X: “Gwen and I are glad to hear that Donald Trump is safe. Violence has no place in our country. It’s not who we are as a nation.”
Authorities have arrested a 58-year-old believed to be the gunman in the shooting. While he hasn’t officially been named, media reports say that he is identified as Ryan Wesley Routh. He has been taken into custody, said law enforcement officials, adding that they found two backpacks and a Go-Pro camera near the perimeter from where he fled.
But who is Routh? What was his motive behind the shooting?
Routh’s run-in with the authorities
According to reports, Routh is a native of North Carolina and has had multiple run-ins with the authorities. This included simple drug possession, driving without a licence, expired inspection and operating a vehicle with no insurance.
As per a Greensboro News & Record report of 2002, Routh was also arrested after barricading himself in his company’s office during a three-hour standoff that followed a traffic stop in which he put his hand on a gun before fleeing.
His LinkedIn profile shows that he relocated to Hawaii around 2017-2018. Living there, he started another construction company, as per his LinkedIn profile, and that firm built simple housing structures for homeless people.
His voter record shows that he was registered as an unaffiliated voter in North Carolina in 2012, most recently voting in person during the state’s Democratic Party primary in March 2024. Federal campaign finance records show Routh made 19 small political donations amounting to $140 since 2019 using his Hawaii address to ActBlue, a political action committee that supports Democratic candidates.
A strong voice on Ukraine
The 58-year-old Routh has expressed strong support for Ukraine since the war broke out — he has posted pro-Kyiv messages on his social media accounts. In 2022, he wrote on X that he was willing to die in the fight and that “we need to burn the Kremlin to the ground.”
“I am willing to fly to Krakow and go to the border of Ukraine to volunteer and fight and die… Can I be the example, we must win,” he wrote on X in March 2022.
The following year, he made the news for trying to recruit overseas volunteers to fight for Ukraine. When the New York Times interviewed him then, he had said that he had travelled to Ukraine after Russia’s invasion and wanted to recruit Afghan soldiers to fight there.
“Afghan Soldiers- Ukraine is somewhat interested in 3000 soldiers, so I need every soldier that has a passport to send me a copy of their passport to send to Ukraine,” he wrote in one social media post, which was published in English and Pashto.
In another interview with Newsweek, Routh was quoted as saying, ““The question as far as why I’m here. To me, a lot of the other conflicts are grey but this conflict is definitely black and white,” he said. “This is about good versus evil.”
“We need thousands and thousands and thousands of people here fighting with Ukrainians,” he added.
Moreover, he also urged US Congress to send money and arms to Ukraine for the war. In one post on X, he wrote to Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky saying, “Forget the no-fly zone - ask Congress to put all American military on paid leave so they can fight. Ask Congress to put all American military on paid leave so they can fight as civilians in Ukraine. Tell Congress what you will pay for all weapons - drones, missiles, planes-everything. Give them a blank check so no US responsibility.”
However, a Ukrainian official told CNN that Routh was never part of the military unit in which overseas volunteers fight. “We can confirm this person reached out to us online multiple times,” Oleksandr Shaguri, an officer of the Foreigners Coordination Department of the Land Forces Command, told CNN over the phone.
“He was offering us large numbers of recruits from different countries but it was obvious to us his offers were not realistic. We didn’t even answer, there was nothing to answer to. He was never part of the Legion and didn’t cooperate with us in any way.”
Routh’s political leanings
It is not yet known what was Routh’s motive for the shooting at Trump if he indeed was the gunman. However, a look at his social media accounts show that he is not a Trump supporter.
His social media posts show that he was a supporter of Vivek Ramaswamy and Nikki Haley and encouraged the Republican presidential candidates to continue their races. “You cannot quit. Why. You must stay on the ballot to the end. You must fight. You must continue giving speeches and push all the way to election day no matter the election results. Do not give in. Join Nikki and keep working. Never give up,” he wrote to Ramaswamy.
In 2020, Routh also expressed support for former Representative Tulsi Gabbard, saying “she will tirelessly negotiate peace deals in Syria, Afghanistan, and all turmoil zones.”
Interestingly, Routh, it appears, voted for Trump in 2016, but lost his faith in him as per a 2020 post on social media. “While you were my choice in 2016, I and the world hoped that President Trump would be different and better than the candidate, but we all were greatly disappointed and it seems you are getting worse and devolving,” he wrote. “I will be glad when you gone.”
He had also previously posted on social media that “Democracy is on the ballot” this year, and “we cannot lose”. Moreover, he had posted about Trump’s assassination attempt in July in Butler, Pennsylvania where he tagged President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. In his message, he wrote that Biden and Harris visit those injured at the rally. “You and Biden should visit the injured people in the hospital from the Trump rally and attend the funeral of the murdered fireman. Trump will never do anything for them,” he wrote in a post directed at Harris.
In an April post on X, he wrote that Biden’s campaign should be: “called something like KADAF. Keep America democratic and free. Trumps should be MASA… Make Americans slaves again master. DEMOCRACY is on the ballot and we cannot lose.”
Son speaks up
Shortly after Routh was taken into custody, Routh’s son, Oran, told the media that his father had visited Ukraine, and described him as passionate about the cause. He was quoted by The Guardian as saying, “My dad went over there and saw people f*****g fighting and dying. He … tried to make sure s**t was cool, and s**t was not cool.”
He also described his father as a loving and honest, hardworking man. “I don’t know what has happened in Florida, and I hope things have just been blown out of proportion, because from the little I’ve heard it doesn’t sound like the man I know to do anything crazy, much less violent,” he said, as per a report in The Guardian.
With inputs from agencies
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