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With few details still known about Thomas Matthew Crooks, the would-be assassin of former President Trump, one member of the House task force probing the assassination attempt is saying the FBI has not been forthcoming with their investigation.
Rep. Mike Waltz, R-Fla., a member of the Bipartisan Assassination Task Force, appeared on “Fox News Sunday” with fellow task force member Rep. Madeleine Dean, D-Penn., to discuss the group’s investigation into the US Secret Service’s failures during the July rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where Crooks fired a series of bullets from a rooftop that was left unchecked.
While Waltz and Dean both said the failures appear to rest with USSS, which has since taken full responsibility, Waltz appreciated that the agency has been forthcoming with the investigation, whereas the FBI – over two months after the assassination attempt – has not.
“The Secret Service is being forthcoming about its failures in communication guidance to locals having appropriate command posts. The FBI, on the other hand, is completely stonewalling this task force,” Waltz said. “It has not been forthcoming.”
In July, FBI Director Christopher Wray initially told House lawmakers that “there’s some question about whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel that, you know, hit his ear.”
Two days later, the bureau issued a statement saying: “What struck former President Trump in the ear was a bullet, whether whole or fragmented into smaller pieces, fired from the deceased subject’s rifle.”
Waltz said he’d like to see Wray and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas hold a press conference like the one USSS recently held.
“We still know virtually nothing about Crooks, the shooter in Butler, about his encrypted accounts, how he learned to build those IEDs,” the congressman said.
On Thursday, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., ranking member of the HSGAC Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, said that what few documents the FBI provided lawmakers were “heavily redacted.”
“I’ve never seen this,” Johnson told reporters of the redactions.
The July 13 Trump rally shooting has heightened scrutiny of USSS, and prompted conversations about whether elected officials are being sufficiently kept safe in today’s hyper-partisan environment.
Waltz said another point of “mounting bipartisan frustration” with the FBI involved Iran, specifically the regime’s multiple ongoing plots to kill Trump and its hacking of Trump campaign information, which it then shared with the Biden-Harris campaign.
“And when asked about it behind closed doors, the FBI would not give us any information to the Intelligence Committee,” Waltz said. “Just this week. It’s completely unacceptable and we need to issue those subpoenas.”
Dean added that it “makes sense” for the task force to investigate the second apparent assassination attempt against Trump that occurred at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Monday, and condemned all political violence.
“I want to set a baseline, which is that political violence has no place in this country,” the congresswoman said.
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Ryan W. Routh, suspected of attempting to assassinate Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump at his West Palm Beach golf course, stands handcuffed after his arrest during a traffic stop near Palm City, Florida, U.S., September 15, 2024.
Martin County Sheriff’s Office | Via Reuters
Ryan Routh stalked Donald Trump for a month in Florida before the alleged would-be assassin was arrested on Sept. 15 after laying in wait with a rifle outside a golf course where the former president was playing, federal prosecutors revealed in a court filing Monday.
The filing also disclosed that Routh months earlier had given another person a box containing a handwritten letter that said, “This was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump but I failed you.”
Routh’s cell phone data shows that he traveled from the Greensboro, North Carolina, area, to West Palm Beach, Florida,” on Aug. 14, according to the filing in U.S. District Court in West Palm Beach.
“On multiple days and times from August 18, 2024, to September 15, 2024, Routh’s cell phone accessed cell towers located near Trump International [Golf Course] and the former President’s residence at Mar-a-Lago” in Palm Beach, the filing said.
And when he was arrested after fleeing his hiding spot just outside the golf course, Routh had in his possession a “handwritten list of dates in August, September, and October 2024 and venues where the former President had appeared or was expected to be present” the filing said.
The filing, known as a proffer, was made by prosecutors in support of their request that a judge order the 58-year-old Routh held without bail when he appears in court Monday.
Routh is charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number.
Trump, who is the Republican nominee for president, narrowly survived an assassination attempt during a campaign rally in western Pennsylvania on July 13. One rally attendee was killed and two other attendees were wounded in that shooting, which ended when a Secret Service sniper killed the gunman.
On Sept. 15, Trump was playing on the fifth hole at Trump International when a Secret Service agent conducting a security sweep “spotted the partially obscured face of a man in the brush along the fence line” near the sixth hole’s green, the court filing said. The man was later identified as Routh.
The agent after seeing the barrel of a rifle aimed directly at him jumped off his golf cart, drew his weapon, and then fired at Routh, according to the filing.
Routh then fled the area.
Photograph of the SKS rifle said to be used in an apparent attempted assassination on Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump in this undated Handout image.
US District Court Southern District of Florida | Via Reuters
Trump, who was several hundred yards away at the time, was “immediately removed” from the course by Secret Service agents, the filing said.
Routh was apprehended by police about 45 minutes later after fleeing in a Nissan Xterra.
FBI agents who searched the area outside the golf course where he had first been spotted found an SKS semiautomatic rifle that had a scope attached and an extended magazine, according to the filing, which said there were 11 rounds found in the rifle, including “a round in the chamber.” The rifle’s serial number was obliterated.
“The agents also found a digital camera, a backpack and a reusable shopping bag hanging from the chain link fence,” the filing said.
Both the backpack and the shopping bag “contained plates” which later ballistics testing showed “were capable of stopping small arms fire,” the filing said.
Bags hang from a fence over a rifle propped against it, after the Secret Service foiled what the FBI called an apparent assassination attempt on Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump while he was golfing on his course in West Palm Beach, Florida, U.S. September 15, 2024.
Pbso | Via Reuters
The Nissan that Routh was driving had a different license plate than the one registered to the vehicle, prosecutors said in the filing.
“During a search of the Nissan Xterra … FBI agents found two additional license plates,” the filing said.
The photograph below shows the obliterated serial number on the rifle said to be used in an apparent attempted assassination on Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump in this undated Handout image.
US District Court Southern District of Florida | Via Reuters
“The agents also found six cellphones. One of the cell phones contained a Google search of how to travel from Palm Beach County to Mexico,” the filing said. “The agents also found 12 pairs of gloves; a Hawaii Driver’s License in the Defendant’s name; a passport in the Defendant’s name.”
And the agents found the handwritten list of dates where Trump had appeared or was expected to be present, according to the filing.
Also in the car was “a notebook with dozens of pages filled with names and phone numbers pertaining to Ukraine, discussions about how to join combat on behalf of Ukraine, and notes criticizing the governments of China and Russia,” the filing said.
FBI agents also reviewed a book apparently written by Routh in February 2023, tilted, “Ukraine’s Unwinnable War: The Fatal Flaw of Democracy, World Abandonment and the Global Citizen-Taiwan, Afghanistan, North Korea, WWIII and the End of Humanity.”
The perimeter of Trump International is surrounded by a chain link fence, and the southeast corner of the course is screened by trees and brush. The 6th hole on the course is near the southeast corner, as shown on the map.
DOJ
Three days after his arrest, a civilian witness contacted authorities and told them that “Routh had dropped off a box at his residence several months prior,” according to the filing.
“The witness stated the box contained ammunition, a metal pipe, miscellaneous building materials, tools, four phones, and various letters,” the filing said.
“One handwritten letter, addressed to “The World,” stated, among other things, ‘This was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump but I failed you. I tried my best and gave it all the gumption I could muster.’ ”
Among other things, the letter said, “He [the former President] ended relations with Iran like a child and now the Middle East has unraveled.”
Routh was legally barred from possessing a firearm because of two prior felony convictions in North Carolina state court, which are detailed in Monday’s court filing.
He was convicted in December 2002 of possessing a weapon of mass destruction, described as a binary explosive device.
In March 2010, he was convicted of multiple counts of possession of stolen goods, the filing noted.
