Trump Plays Through Another Hazard

Just 67 days after Thomas Matthew Crooks came close to killing Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, another wannabe assassin tried his luck. As Trump was golfing on Sunday at his resort in West Palm Beach, Florida, with Steve Witkoff, a real estate mogul, friend, and donor, a Secret Service agent spotted the suspect with an AK-47-style rifle poking through the golf course fence, about 300 to 500 yards from the former president. The agent immediately fired and the failed shooter fled the scene. Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, was arrested a short time later. Trump was unharmed.

Law enforcement agents later found two backpacks in the bushes with ceramic tiles and a GoPro camera; the latter indicating intent to film what was going on.

Routh is an avid Ukraine supporter and visited Kyiv in 2022, which has been pounced on by pro-Russian channels. Routh was active on social media, and had even been interviewed by the New York Times in March 2023 about his support for Ukraine. No motive has been confirmed, though Routh’s Ukraine links could have spurred him to go after Trump, whose support for that beleaguered country has been lukewarm at best.

Both Biden and Harris condemned the violence, but that hasn’t stopped the political point-scoring, with outraged Republicans accusing the Democrats of fueling the sentiment behind the attack by presenting Trump as a threat to democracy who must be stopped. There’s also a sense of déjà vu — how was such a security breach allowed?