Suspect Ryan Wesley Routh appears in court, faces gun charges after Trump assassination attempt

Former President Trump will host a town hall event in Flint, Michigan, on Tuesday, the first campaign event since the latest attempt on his life.

Trump will be at Flint’s Dort Financial Center on Tuesday evening for a town hall-style event, where he is expected to take questions from the audience and focus remarks on the auto industry and inflation.

The event comes just two days after Trump survived a second assassination attempt, this time while playing golf at Trump National Golf Club in Florida on Sunday.

Trump’s Flint town hall will be moderated by Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who is expected to take on a larger role in campaigning for the former president in the homestretch of the campaign.

The event comes as the campaigns are now within the last 50 days of the election, with both candidates scrambling to solidify support ahead of November. Michigan figures to play a key role for both Trump and his opponent, Vice President Harris, being one of the swing states most likely to turn the election in either candidate’s favor.

According to the Real Clear Politics polling average, Harris currently holds a slight lead over Trump in the state with an average of 48.3% support to Trump’s 47.6%.

Read the full article by Fox News' Michael Lee.

Now that alleged would-be Trump assassin Ryan Routh is in custody, the FBI and Florida police will have their hands full unraveling his planning process and what may have motivated him.

Former NYPD investigator and security expert Patrick Brosnan told Fox News Digital that investigators will need to trawl through a litany of information in the coming weeks, including "all things cellular, online shopping; phone camera images, bank records, email correspondence, recent search engine inquiries, dating app activity, identification of any possible burner phones, footage from … city streets, UPS trucks, Amazon trucks or backup cameras, and all cell tower pings within a fixed distance."

Using this information, investigators will build Routh's profile to answer these questions, according to Gene Petrino, a SWAT commander with nearly three decades in law enforcement and a master's degree in security management.

1. Did Ryan Wesley Routh act alone?

2. What was Routh's motive?

3. How did Routh come into possession of a firearm?

4. How did Routh know where to lie in wait?

Read the full article by Fox News'  Christina Coulter.

Failed Trump assassination attempt suspect Ryan Routh has a lengthy arrest record in Guilford County, North Carolina, where he was once a resident of Greensboro.

Routh's arrest record in Guilford County spans between the 1980s and 2010, and his charges range from writing multiple bad checks to felony firearm possession, possession of a stolen vehicle and multiple counts of possession of a weapon of mass destruction in 2002, specifically, a "binary explosive with a 10-in[ch] detonation cord and a blasting cap."

A neighbor who said she had known Routh for about 18 years, before he moved to Hawaii and left his Greensboro home empty at least a year ago, described his family as "weird" to reporters outside her home next to Routh's former North Carolina residence.

"He had a horse in the house. I mean, a whole live horse in the house. But I could see the guns and stuff and all. They were … oh, I mean, kind of weird. But they didn't bother me. I didn't bother them," Kim Mungo said.

"I told all my friends because they didn't believe me," Mungo added.

She said the family never expressed any strong political views.

Read the full article by Fox News' Audrey Conklin.

Former President Trump survived a second assassination attempt in just two months over the weekend after the U.S. Secret Service opened fire on an armed man near a fence as the billionaire candidate golfed in Florida.

Police recovered an SKS rifle that the suspect allegedly aimed through a fence at the edge of the course.

But as additional details about the suspect emerge, he appears to be a radical activist incensed by geopolitical conflict and a repeat offender with a violent felony conviction to match his ideological online posts, which are under investigation by the FBI.

In the years before his arrest on Sunday, suspect Ryan Wesley Routh had dozens of run-ins with the law and was outspoken on political issues, particularly the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Read the full article on the timeline of the second assassination attempt by Fox News' Michael Ruiz.

Shares of Trump Media and Technology Group fell in choppy action on Monday, a day after another would-be assassin made an attempt on the life of former President Trump, who is the majority shareholder.

The stock was down nearly 4% at $17.30 per share in afternoon trade.

The slump comes after shares of Trump Media, which owns Truth Social, surged as much as 30% on Friday and closed up 12% after the former president told the press he would not sell his shares in the firm and that he would not leave the social media platform.

Trump owns about 57% of Trump Media, which also saw its shares slump last week following his televised debate with Democratic rival Vice President Kamala Harris after weeks of steady declines ahead of key dates this month when Trump and other company insiders will be allowed to sell their shares.

Trump Media saw its value balloon to nearly $10 billion following its stock market listing in March. Trump Media's stock is popular among retail traders and is seen as a speculative bet on his chances of securing a second four-year term as president.

However, since its listing, Trump Media shares have lost most of their value, with losses accelerating in recent weeks after President Biden gave up his re-election bid and Trump lost a lead in opinion polls ahead of the Nov. 5 presidential election.

Fox Business' Breck Dumas contributed to this report.

Eric Trump, son of former President Trump, told Fox News' Sean Hannity that it feels like déjà vu after his father survived a second assassination attempt and that it feels like he was having the same conversation he had in July, when the former president survived his first assassination attempt.

"The View" co-host Sunny Hostin highlighted the results of a poll released in July that found 10% of Americans support violence against Donald Trump, which she said was "despicable," following a second assassination attempt against the former president.

"I am so saddened and disturbed by the fact that political violence is so normalized in this country," Hostin said. "There is more support for violence today against Trump and others, against Trump, 10% of American adults think it’s OK," suggesting that meant tens of millions of Americans would support such conduct.

The poll, released by the University of Chicago via the Chicago Project on Security and Threats, found that 26 million Americans believe "the use of force" is justified to keep Trump from regaining the presidency. Of the 26 million, the poll found, nine million have guns, and 22 million have access to "internet organizational tools."

"That's despicable," added Hostin, who is a fierce critic of the president and strong supporter of Kamala Harris. The suspect in the second assassination attempt against Trump, Ryan Wesely Routh, was arrested Sunday afternoon after authorities spotted a rifle barrel poking out of shrubbery on the West Palm Beach golf course where Trump was playing.

The same survey found about 7% of respondents said force was justified to restore Trump to the presidency.

Hostin cited other instances of political violence, including against Nancy Pelosi's husband Paul in 2022, and said it happened on both sides of the aisle.

Fox News' Hanna Panreck contributed to this report.

The tree line at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida, has been known for years to be a vantage point for photographers looking to catch a candid glimpse of the former president and other VIPs.

Still, suspected failed assassin Ryan Wesley Routh was able to camp out there for nearly 12 hours Sunday with a rifle aimed at the course, according to a federal affidavit. He even brought snacks.

A Secret Service agent patrolling the perimeter eventually spotted the gunman and opened fire, chasing him off before anyone was hurt. But local authorities say additional perimeter patrols would be an obvious safety upgrade when Donald Trump comes to town.

Trump is known to frequent the course when staying at his Mar-a-Lago resort about 15 minutes away. And even though the visit wasn't on the president's schedule, anyone staking out the area could have been tipped off to his arrival by his motorcade.

"There have been previous individuals who have taken pictures of the former president while he's golfing," said Dave Aronberg, the state attorney for the 15th Judicial Circuit, which covers Palm Beach County. "They've gone through the shrubs and been able to poke a camera through the fencing. You would think that perhaps maybe they would consider someone scoping the perimeter."

Photographers routinely announce their presence to the Secret Service and are well versed in where they can get a good line of sight, the New York Post reported. They are rarely asked to leave, an unnamed photo agency source told the paper.

Fox News' Michael Ruiz and Julia Bonavita contributed to this report.

Rep. Mikie Sherrill, D-N.J., said on Monday how the second assassination attempt against former President Trump was a "confluence" of Republican "misinformation" and "fear-mongering" alongside the "complete availability of assault rifles."

Sherrill spoke to CNN’s Jim Acosta one day after Secret Service agents successfully thwarted the assassination attempt at Trump International Golf Club, opening fire on the suspect who was later taken into custody.

Although Sherrill acknowledged the Secret Service needed to do more to protect Trump, she linked the attempted assassination to the GOP.

"I think we also have to address some underlying issues that are going on here as well. This really seems to be the confluence of two very bad things going on in the Republican Party," Sherrill said.

She added, "On one side, the attempts to divide, to enrage the population, to put out false rumors and misinformation. We know the mayor in Springfield is begging the Republican Party to stop with the false information on immigrants. They have portions of the town on lockdown at this point, and an increase in all of the partisanship and the fear-mongering that’s going on."

"And then on the other side, we have this complete availability of assault rifles, too. It seems almost anyone who wants to have access. So how did this man, who already had some convictions for barricading himself with a weapon, have access to weapons of war that I was trained on when I was in the military?" Merrill asked.

Fox News' Lindsay Kornick contributed to this report.

Steve Witkoff, a real estate developer and close friend of former President Trump, described the chaotic moments during a failed assassination attempt on the president's life on Sunday as both men played a round of golf.

Witkoff was with Trump when a U.S. Secret Service agent spotted someone with a firearm in a treeline near the course and opened fire, authorities said. Despite the chaos, Trump remained “stoic," and "courageous,” he said.

Witkoff was walking with Trump on the golf course when they heard gunshots.

“I actually feel blessed that I was there yesterday,” Witkoff told “Hannity.” “And the reason I feel blessed, Sean, is that I got to see what it's like for my dear friend to live his normal life. His normal life, which is punctuated by two attempts to assassinate him in the last 60 days, being vilified since he left the presidency, falsely accused, harassed.”

He said the Secret Service acted heroically and that sniper teams deployed next to him with tripods and aiming their weapons, Witkoff said.

“Each and every one of them put themselves in harm's way, to put themselves in between the shooter and the president," he said. "I was standing up. As I said to this day, I say to this minute, I don't know why I continue to stand.”

The suspect didn't fire any shots and Trump was never in his line of sight, Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe said Monday. Witkoff praised Trump's realtime reaction to the incident, saying he felt inspired.

“He's so courageous that it, you know, you feel inspired that you want… you want to demonstrate a little bit of that yourself if you can,” Witkoff added.

“I have a little love thing for my dear friend and I say to myself thank God that he was not injured or more or killed,” he added. “And thank God none of the other people. The there were plenty of civilians, by the way, staffers from his office, people who care about him just as much as I do to other friends of his. So there could have been a lot of really serious damage out there.” 

Former President Trump, during a X Spaces appearance Monday, said President Biden was “very nice” during a brief phone call between the two following another assassination attempt on Trump.

“He was very nice today. They called me to make sure I was okay, to make sure that, you know, do I have any suggestions or [whether] we do need more people on my details because we have 50 to 60,000 people showing up to events,” Trump said.

The White House said earlier Monday that Trump and Biden had had a “cordial” conversation and that the president “conveyed his relief.”

Former President Trump spoke on X Spaces Monday evening, after surviving yet another assassination attempt in two months.

The Republican presidential candidate commended the “excellent job” of the Secret Service and authorities who have put a “very dangerous person” behind bars.

Trump said he was on the golf course with some friends when “we heard shots being fired in the air and I guess probably four or five … bullets.”

Trump said he and his companions were whisked away in golf carts by the Secret Service.

“I would have loved to take that last putt but we decided, ‘let’s get out of here,’” Trump quipped.

Trump noted that the suspected gunman – later identified as 58-year-old Ryan Routh – never managed to fire a shot, and ran across the street before hopping in a car.

“And amazingly, a civilian in that area saw something and it looked very suspicious. And in the car drove the car to the back of his truck of some kind. And took pictures of the license plate, gave him to the sheriff's office,” Trump said.

The Republican candidate blamed the second assassination attempt on divisive rhetoric from Democrats and “the radical left.”

Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, on Monday called for the nation to tone down the political rhetoric after former President Trump survived yet another assassination attempt.

In a lengthy post on X, Vance commended the Republican presidential candidate “for calling for peace and calm” but argued that the “rhetoric is out of control.”

“It nearly got Donald Trump killed twice,” Vance wrote, arguing that Democrats would be much more fired up if he was revealed that the suspect had been a Republican donor.

“This seems to be a double standard but at a deep level, it is entirely consistent,” Vance said.

The VP nominee pledged to “vigorously defend” free speech – even that which criticizes himself and his running mate, Donald J. Trump.

“But when I ask you to ‘tone down the rhetoric’ it’s not about being nice – our citizens have right to be mean, even if I don’t like it – or empty platitudes,” Vance said. “Instead, I'm asking all of us to reject censorship. Reject the idea that you can control what other people think and say. Embrace persuasion of your fellow citizens over silencing them--either through the powers of Big Tech or through moral blackmail.”

Vance ended the post arguing that rejecting censorship means rejecting political violence, while embracing censorship means embracing violence “on its behalf.”

“The reason is simple,” Vance said. “The logic of censorship leads directly to one place, for there is only one way to permanently silence a human being: put a bullet in his brain.”

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Monday reiterated his state would conduct its own investigation into the second assassination attempt on former President Trump.

Speaking with Fox News’ Jesse Watters, the Republican governor said the people of Florida deserve to know the truth about where the suspect came from and what his motivations were.

“I don’t think it’s in the best interests of this country to say that agencies like the FBI and the DOJ – which are trying to prosecute Trump in South Florida; they’re on appeal at the 11th Circuit to reinstate an indictment that had been dismissed – that they’re the best people to … give us the truth about this, this defendant, but also prosecute the case where they don’t have as strong of jurisdictional claims.”

DeSantis said fence line of the golf course where authorities said a suspect pointed an SKS-style rifle at the Republican presidential candidate “is clearly the biggest point of vulnerability on that course.”

“If you’re burrowed into … shrubs, you have a pretty clear line of sigh on a number of golf holes,” DeSantis said.

The governor then criticized Democrats for what he deemed their lack of sympathy over the second assassination attempt on the former president in two months.

“They’re just all out with the rhetoric all over again,” DeSantis said. “There's a lot of people in our society who may have a screw loose. And if you're constantly telling them that American democracy is going to end, if this guy gets elected president, well, somebody is going to feel that they're justified for doing this. And so I do think the apocalyptic rhetoric has increased the threats to Donald Trump. No question about.”

One of Ohio's most prominent newspapers published a letter to the editor blaming former President Trump for the assassination attempts that have occurred against him, saying he "brings a lot of this stuff on himself."

Cincinnati's The Enquirer, part of the Gannett-owned USA Today Network of newspapers, ran a letter penned by a woman from the suburb of Sharonville.

"There is no place in politics for violence. That said, the former president, Donald Trump, brings a lot of this stuff on himself," the Sharonville resident wrote in her letter.

“When he continues to push lies about legal immigrants like the ones in Springfield, Ohio; when he continues to insist he was not the loser of the 2020 election; when he continues to spout how he wants to use our military to ‘round up’ and deport immigrants who are not White from this country, he brings the crazies out, and one of those crazies tries to shoot him,” the letter continues.

The woman then suggested that the costs and resources to put up the Secret Service at Trump's properties are a factor in the near misses on the former president's life.

"One thing Trump can do to reduce the chance that one of these crazies will attempt to assassinate him is to stop charging the American people thousands of dollars per night for his Secret Service protectors to stay at his Trump-owned properties, as reported by NPR and other news outlets. (I am sure each agent has their own room, too.)" the woman said. "Those excess monies can then be used to put more Secret Service agents on his protection detail. Otherwise, why should the American people continue to put out extra millions for protection that is only needed because the former president can't keep from lying and bringing these issues on himself?"

Read the full article on the letter to the editor by Joseph A. Wulfsohn.

Sen. JD Vance on Monday recounted getting the phone call from former President Trump minutes after surviving yet another assassination attempt.

Speaking at the Faith and Freedom gathering in Cobb County, Georgia Monday, Trump’s running mate said he was at home in Cincinnati, Ohio with his kids when he got the call.

“So, I answer and he says, ‘JD, you’re not going to believe this, but they tried to do it again,’” Vance recounted of their conversation.

The Republican VP nominee said that Trump told him he was mad because he “was about to make a birdie putt on the sixth hole, and they wouldn’t let me finish.”

“That is the kind of guy that you want to be president of the United States, right? Who’s fazed by nothing,” Vance said. “I think I was, without question, bothered by it more than he was.”

Vance told the audience to take the opportunity “to call for a reduction in the ridicule and inflammatory political rhetoric coming from too many corners of our politics.”

“Look, we can disagree with one another. We can debate one another, but we cannot tell the American people that one candidate is a fascist and if he is elected, it is going to be the end of American Democracy,” Vance said. 

Former President Trump is “far too predictable” in his movements, a former U.S. Secret Service special agent said.

Trump wasn't slated to play a round of golf on Sunday when his life was in danger for a second time in two months, Charles Marino, a former Secret Service agent and former Homeland Security adviser told “Special Report” host Brett Baier.

“The former president is far too predictable. And what we saw here was a suspect that played the odds," Marino said. "He camped out for over 12 hours and he played the odds that the president was going to show up and know what he did. And the secret's out of the bag.”

Trump made an unannounced trip to play golf where the suspect allegedly waited for him to appear, authorities said Monday.

“When former presidents show up, you see the increased police presence, the Secret Service motorcade," Marino said. "So he knew that he got it right and he waited for a chance to attack.”

Fox News Digital has obtained an old mugshot of the suspect in the second assassination bid attempt of former President Trump.

The mugshot shows a 2010 booking photo of the suspect, Ryan Wesley Routh, in the custody of the Guildford County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina.

The FBI said Monday that Routh has numerous brushes with the law between 1997 and 2010. The 2010 mugshot is for multiple counts of stolen goods.

Special Agent in Charge Jeffrey Veltri said Routh was the subject of a closed investigation in 2019 when someone reported he was in possession of a firearm despite a prior felony conviction, but Veltri said the tipster would not confirm making the report.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said it was “cravenly absurd” for former President Trump to blame Vice President Harris for the alleged attempt on his life for the second time in as many months.

“Blatantly cravenly absurd. Misleading," Blumenthal told Fox News. "And it does a disservice to the Secret Service, which is trying to improve the way it provides protection and it must improve the way it provides protection.”

“So I think that it distracts from the essential purpose,” he added.

On Monday, Trump blamed Harris for rhetoric he said has “taken politics in our Country to a whole new level of Hatred, Abuse, and Distrust.”

Blumenthal said Trump's rhetoric evokes emotion and strong views that may present challenges to the U.S. Secret Service, who are charged with protecting the former president.

“The Secret Service has a job to do. And if it needs more resources, it has an obligation to request it,” Blumenthal said. “But I think that the failures that we found in the lapses that have been revealed go beyond simply resources, how the resources are used and how accountability is imposed.”