Ryan Routh: What we know about suspect after apparent assassination attempt on Donald Trump
Details have emerged about the suspect who was arrested after an “apparent assassination attempt” on Donald Trump – with reports the alleged gunman said he had previously flown to Ukraine to help its fight against Russia.
Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, was identified by three senior law enforcement officials, Sky News’s US partner network NBC News reported.
He was detained after gunshots were heard near to where Mr Trump was playing at his Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach in Florida on Sunday.
Follow latest: Suspect was ‘lying wait for Trump’
An AK-47 type assault rifle weapon and a scope, two backpacks and a GoPro device were recovered at the scene, Palm Beach County sheriff Ric Bradshaw said in a news conference.
It comes just nine weeks after Mr Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, was injured in an assassination attempt at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in July.
What we know about the suspect
According to records, Routh lived in North Carolina for most of his life before moving to Kaaawa, Hawaii, in 2018, the Associated Press reported.
In Hawaii, he and his son appeared to operate a company building sheds, according to an archived version of the webpage for the business.
In relation to the incident at Mr Trump’s golf course on Sunday, Routh’s son has told CNN that he hopes “everything has been blown out of proportion” and that it would be unlike his father to “do anything crazy, much less violent”.
Oran Routh said: “Ryan is my father, and I don’t have any comment beyond a character profile of him as a loving and caring father, and honest, hardworking man… He’s a good father, and a great man, and I hope you can portray him in an honest light.”
It is not clear how many children Routh has and whether Oran is the same son who the suspect ran a business with.
Meanwhile, records show Routh 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.
Pic: Ryan Routh/Facebook
Campaign finance records show Routh has made 19 small political donations totalling around $140 (£106) since 2019 to ActBlue, a political action committee that supports Democratic candidates.
Although he appears to have supported the Democrats in recent years, it seems Routh voted for Mr Trump in the 2016 presidential election before changing his mind about him during his time in office.
Routh wrote in a social media post in June 2020: “While you were my choice in 2106 (sic), I and the world hoped that president Trump would be different and better than the candidate, but we all were greatly disappointment and it seems you are getting worse and devolving.
“I will be glad when you gone.”
Previous brushes with the law
The Washington Post reports that public records show Routh faced criminal charges over two separate incidents in 2002 for possession of a weapon of mass destruction – which can refer to a machine gun.
He pleaded guilty to the first charge in April 2002, but no other details were publicly available, according to the newspaper.
The News & Record reported that later that year he was also charged after barricading himself in a United Roofing building in Greensboro for three hours, armed with a machine gun.
The incident began after he was pulled over for a traffic stop, but police eventually arrested him without incident.
In that case, he is said to have pleaded guilty to driving without a licence and registration, resisting a public officer and carrying a concealed firearm – while public records reportedly indicate the weapon of mass destruction charge was dropped.
It came years after he was featured in a profile by the News & Record newspaper in 1991 for his assistance in helping defend a woman against an alleged rapist.
Under the headline “Crimefighting pays”, the then 25-year-old was described as a “super citizen” after being awarded a Law Enforcement Oscar by the Greensboro chapter of the International Union of Police Association.
The gun, backpacks and GoPro found on Donald Trump’s golf course
Support for Ukraine
Routh is reported to have said he travelled to Ukraine in an attempt to help the country in its fight against Russia.
A video has emerged of an interview he gave to Newsweek in 2022 where he spoke about his efforts to recruit volunteers for Ukraine’s ground forces.
He says in the footage: “This conflict is definitely black and white… This is about good versus evil.”
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Video of Trump shooting suspect
Routh later says in the video: “Why world leaders are not sending military (to Ukraine) is beyond me. We’re going to have to elect new leaders the next go round, that have a backbone and have the fortitude to say ‘we’re not going to tolerate this type of behaviour (from Russia)’.”
He became emotional as he said: “When you talk to a 20-year-old guy, that’s sold everything he owns to come here to fight, that is heroism.”
Last year, Routh did an interview with the news platform Semafor in his role as the self-appointed director of a group he started called the International Volunteer Center – part of his efforts to try to help bring foreign troops into Ukraine.
He complained that the Ukrainian government was being too rigid about admitting some foreign soldiers.
“Ukraine is very often hard to work with… They’re afraid that anybody and everybody is a Russian spy,” he said.
Ryan Routh during a rally for support of Ukraine in Kyiv in 2022.
Pic: Public Broadcasting Company of Ukraine Suspilne/Reuters
Routh had tried to enlist Afghan conscripts by presenting himself as an off-the-books liaison for the Ukrainian government.
He told Semafor he was working to find a house in Pakistan to temporarily lodge Afghans hoping to fight in Ukraine.
Routh also expressed strong support for Ukraine in dozens of posts on X in 2022, saying 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,” Routh said in an X post in March 2022.
Routh also used his personal Facebook account last year to encourage foreigners to fight in the war.
It has also emerged Routh wrote a book about the conflict where he described how he “gave up and quit”, a decision he says makes him “the worst of humans”.
The book, called Ukraine’s Unwinnable War, was previously on sale on Amazon for £2.25.
He writes: “I am the failure, the hypocrite that wants the world to change but let communism beat me down and exhaust me and send me home.
“A mere 5 months and I run for home, not even with the first bit of mud, or cold, or the first bullet, and I am beaten and exhausted in the simplest elementary ground floor challenges of good and evil, and I fail.”
Canadians “weren’t impressed” by the decision of the UK government to offer Donald Trump an unprecedented second state visit to the UK, the country’s prime minister has told Sky News.
Sir Keir Starmer handed the invitation to the US president during a visit to the Oval Office.
The newly elected Liberal leader Mark Carney said that the invitation “cut across clear messages” that the Canadian government was trying to send to the White House in response to their threats against Canada’s sovereignty.
“I think, to be frank, they [Canadians] weren’t impressed by that gesture… given the circumstance. It was at a time when we were being quite clear about the issues around sovereignty.”
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Mark Carney speaking to Sky News’ Sam Washington
It comes as the Canadian prime minister has invited the King, who is Canada’s head of state, to open its parliament later this month in a “clear message of sovereignty”.
It is the first time the sovereign has carried out this function in nearly 50 years and Mr Carney says it’s “not coincidental”.
“All issues around Canada’s sovereignty have been accentuated by the president. So no, it’s not coincidental, but it is also a reaffirming moment for Canadians.”
The former Bank of England governor was re-elected after a campaign fought on the promise of standing up to American threats to Canadian statehood. He had refused to speak to Mr Trump until Canadian sovereignty was respected.
It followed Mr Trump threatening to make Canada the 51st state of the US.
Mr Carney justified making his first trip after winning re-election to the White House by stating Mr Trump had changed his intentions to annex Canada from an “expectation to a desire”.
“He was expressing a desire. He’d shifted from the expectation to a desire. He was also coming from a place where he recognised that that wasn’t going to happen.
“Does he still muse about it? Perhaps. Is it ever going to happen? No. Never.”
The high-stakes meeting in the Oval Office was not confrontational, with Mr Carney praising the president’s approach as “very on top of the essence of a wide range of issues” and “able to identify the points of maximum leverage, both in a specific situation but also in a geopolitical situation”.
A King’s tension between allies
Fractured geopolitical relations have produced an interesting phenomenon: two Commonwealth nations both deploying their head of state, King Charles, to manage the vagaries of Donald Trump.
For Canada, and its new prime minister, Mark Carney, the King is being unveiled at the opening of Parliament in Ottawa later this month as an unequivocal spectacle and symbol of sovereignty.
For the UK, Sir Keir Starmer is positioning the monarch as a bridge and has proffered a personal invitation from King Charles to the president for an unprecedented second state visit in order to facilitate negotiations over trade and tariffs.
This instrumentalisation of the crown, which ordinarily transcends politics, has created tension between the historically close allies.
Canadians view the UK’s red carpet treatment of a leader who is openly threatening their sovereignty as a violation of Commonwealth solidarity, while the British seem to have no compunction in engaging in high-level realpolitik.
The episode is emblematic of how pervasive disruptive American influence is and how extreme measures taken to combat it can aggravate even the most enduring alliances.
Since the meeting, tensions between the two countries have abated.
Further negotiations on trade and security are expected soon.
Given the deep economic integration of the two nations, neither side expects a deal imminently, but both sides concur that constructive talks have led to progress on an agreement.
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With greater goodwill between the two North American neighbours, Mr Carney also expressed optimism about Mr Trump’s efforts to broker peace between Ukraine and Russia.
The prime minister confirmed his view that the president was an “honest broker” and that his counterpart had been “helpful” in bringing momentum to a 30-day ceasefire between the warring nations.
Despite a reset in relations between the United States and Canada, Mr Carney remained circumspect.
His motto is: “Always plan for the worst.”
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And to that end, nothing is being taken for granted: “We do plan for having no deal, we do plan for trouble in the security relationship. We do plan for the global trading system not being reassembled: that’s the way to approach this president.”
World
‘Sixteen killed’ in strike on Gaza hospital as Israel says it hit ‘Hamas command centre below’
At least 16 people have been killed and 70 others were injured at a hospital in Gaza following an Israeli strike, according to the health ministry.
Nine missiles hit the European Hospital and its courtyard in the south of the Palestinian territory, officials said.
Israel said it had hit a “Hamas command centre” beneath the hospital in Khan Younis.
Hamas denies exploiting hospitals and civilian properties for military purposes.
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The scene after the European Hospital was partially damaged following Israeli airstrikes. Pic: Reuters
Earlier, a well-known Palestinian photojournalist died following a separate attack on the Nasser Hospital, also in Khan Younis, said the ministry.
Hassan Aslih had been accused by Israel of working with Hamas and was recovering from an earlier airstrike.
Aslih, who has hundreds of thousands of followers on social media, was said by the Israelis to have recorded and uploaded footage of “looting, arson and murder” during Hamas’s 7 October 2023 attack into Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Aslih was one of two patients who died in Tuesday’s strike on Nasser Hospital, said the health ministry. Several others were wounded.
Mourners carry the body of Palestinian journalist Hassan Aslih. Pic: Reuters
Dozens of people were being treated on the third floor of the hospital building, where the missiles struck, Reuters said, quoting Ahmed Siyyam, a member of Gaza’s emergency services.
The Israeli military said it “eliminated significant Hamas terrorists” in Nasser Hospital, among them Aslih, who it said had “operated under the guise of a journalist”.
Footage showed heavy damage to one of the hospital buildings, including to medical equipment and beds inside.
At least 160 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza since the start of the war, according to the International Federation of Journalists.
Gazan officials accuse Israel of deliberately targeting journalists. Israel denies this and says it tries to avoid harm to civilians.
Aslih, who headed the Alam24 news outlet and had previously worked with Western news outlets, was recovering after being wounded last month in a deadly strike on a tent in the Nasser Hospital compound.
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Meanwhile, President Trump has spoken on the phone to Edan Alexander after he was released by Hamas on Monday, as part of ongoing efforts to achieve a permanent ceasefire with Israel.
The 21-year-old was believed to be the last living American hostage in Gaza.
Some 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage in the 7 October attack on southern Israel, according to Israeli figures.
Israel’s response has killed more than 52,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials, and destroyed much of the coastal territory. Gaza’s health ministry records do not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
An aid blockade since March has left the population at critical risk of famine, according to the World Health Organisation, which warned on Tuesday that hunger and malnutrition could have a lasting impact on “an entire generation”.
Donald Trump has said the US will lift long-standing sanctions on Syria and signed a $600bn (£450bn) deal with Saudi Arabia as he visited the nation as part of a tour of the Middle East.
The US president revealed the US plans to lift sanctions on Syria following talks with Saudi Arabia‘s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Mr Trump was speaking at the US-Saudi investment conference during a four-day trip to the region.
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The comments follow Air Force One being escorted by Royal Saudi Air Force F-15s as it approached the kingdom’s capital, with Mr Trump welcomed by the crown prince, Saudi’s de facto ruler, as he stepped off the plane.
President Trump said the relationship between the were nations were “stronger and more powerful than ever before”, adding it would “remain that way”.
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How Trump’s Saudi visit unfolded
‘Largest defence cooperation agreement’
Mr Trump and Prince Mohammed signed several agreements aimed at increasing cooperation between their governments, including a commitment to $600bn in new Saudi investment in the US – though Mr Trump said a trillion dollars (£750bn) would be even better.
The US also agreed to sell Saudi Arabia an arms package worth nearly $142bn (£107bn), which the White House called “the largest defence cooperation agreement” Washington has ever done.
Royal Saudi Air Force F-15s provide an honorary escort for Air Force One. Pic: AP
In his speech, President Trump also urged Iran to take a “new and a much better path” and make a new nuclear deal with the US.
Speaking at the conference, Mr Trump said he wants to avoid a conflict with Iran but warned of “maximum pressure” if his olive branch was rejected.
Pic: AP
“As I have shown repeatedly, I am willing to end past conflicts and forge new partnerships for a better and more stable world, even if our differences may be profound,” he said.
“If Iran’s leadership rejects this olive branch… we will have no choice but to inflict massive maximum pressure, drive Iranian oil exports to zero.”
He added: “Iran will never have a nuclear weapon. But with that said, Iran can have a much brighter future, but we’ll never allow America and its allies to be threatened with terrorism or nuclear attack. The choice is theirs to make.”
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Pic: Reuters
Normalising relations with Syria
Mr Trump said he would ease US sanctions on Syria and move to normalise relations with its new government ahead of a meeting with its new leader Ahmad al Sharaa on Wednesday.
The Syrian president was formerly an insurgent who led the overthrow of former leader Bashar al Assad last year.
Mr Trump said he wants to give the country “a chance at peace” and added: “There is a new government that will hopefully succeed. I say good luck, Syria. Show us something special.”
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The US leader also said he hoped Saudi Arabia would soon join the Abraham Accords and recognise Israel “in your own time”.
Saudi Arabia has argued its recognition of Israel would be tied to the establishment of a Palestinian state along the lines of Israel’s 1967 borders.
Mr Trump will travel to Qatar and the United Arab Emirates over the next three days.
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