The second attack on the former president in two months occurred Sunday afternoon when Trump was playing golf at his Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw told reporters. A Secret Service agent standing up the course from Trump spotted suspect Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, hiding in shrubbery near a fence at the edge of the course and carrying an AK-47-style rifle, Bradshaw said.
The agent fired, and Routh fled.
Trump was an estimated 400 yards from Routh, Bradshaw said. The late Thomas Matthew Crooks was an estimated 147 yards from Trump when he shot from a rooftop, nicking Trump’s ear on July 13.
Erik Prince is the founder of the private military contractor Blackwater, now one of several companies under the umbrella of Constellis Holdings LLC. Prince said on American Family Radio Monday that DeSantis is the clear choice to lead the investigation.
“It’s an attempted murder in his state. The organs of federal law enforcement are either clearly incompetent or hyper-compromised by politics. That’s a really bad combination,” Prince told show host Jenna Ellis.
These unqualified agents are also lacking in number, Prince said.
“I have no confidence in the federal government being able to investigate itself any further," he stated, adding: "… If we think [the FBI field office is] going to do an honest job of investigating this, the special agent in charge of that was a militant anti-Trumper, who when they were appointed to that position had to scrub their entire social media history of all the anti-Trump statements he’d made as an FBI agent.”
Whistleblower testimony last November revealed FBI agent Jeffrey Veltri was told to remove his anti-Trump social media posts before accepting the promotion to special agent in charge of the FBI’s Miami field office which covers much of South Florida, including Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate, according to The Washington Times via Newsweek.
Trump’s history with Miami FBI
The FBI’s Miami team has a disturbing history with Trump, according to Prince. “These are the same guys that raided Trump on a completely nonsense documents case on behalf of Jack Smith, the special prosecutor," he noted.
Gov. DeSantis said Sunday evening that the state of Florida will conduct a parallel investigation. “The people deserve the truth about the would-be assassin and how he was able to get within 500 yards of the former president and current GOP nominee,” DeSantis, Trump’s chief rival in a brief run for the nomination, wrote on X.
An even more aggressive response from the state would be appropriate, Prince said.
“If I were governor, I would not have turned over the suspect to the Feds until state law enforcement had thoroughly interrogated him and done a very detailed analysis of all electronics and all his messaging, all his whereabouts for the last years.”
It hasn’t been pretty, but Trump has now survived two assassination attempts. Eliminating or detaining suspects is treating the symptoms of a much larger problem.
Why are these attacks occurring?
Military historian and conservative commentator Victor Davis Hanson, in a lengthy X post Sunday, raised the possibility of a potentially lethal combination of “lax Secret Service protection coupled with general social media and TV climate that equates Trump with Hitler and lowers the bar of the assassination.”
His post continued:
“Are we sending unambiguous messages to would-be assassins that a) lots of Trump-hating people would welcome an assassination attempt and canonize the wannabe assailant; b) it would not be that difficult to pull off an assassination given security laxity and incompetence; and thus c) we will likely witness a series of such unhinged attempts.”
Golf course-security presents a number of challenges, Ken Valentine, a Secret Service veteran with 10 years on the presidential protection detail, told AFN.
“An AK-47 without a scope has an effective range of least 400 yards, so an AK-47 with the scope, you’re talking about greater capability,” Valentine said. “He was engaged by the Secret Service just the way they’re trained, but he was allowed to get awfully close for my comfort.”
Law enforcement officials were able to take Routh alive, meaning they could gain valuable information in the days ahead – possibly including if there’s a mole somewhere close to or within Trump’s security detail, according to Valentine.
“This particular shooter had the intelligence to know where to go that he would be able to not only put down shots but to get away. That’s a little disturbing to me,” Valentine admitted.
Relentless rhetoric from Democrats
Hanson listed multiple examples of Democrats – including the top two, Joe Biden and Democratic nominee Kamala Harris – engaging in volatile Trump rhetoric. It’s not uncommon to see the rhetoric unchallenged by media hosts in televised appearances, he said.
“These serial assassination attempts, unfortunately, occur in a weary context of Russian collusion, laptop disinformation, state ballot removal, and lawfare," Hanson posted. "And they are starting to reflect a larger environment of justifying extra-legal means to achieve the ends of (first) ending Trump’s presidency and later reelection by any means necessary.”
If the rhetoric doesn’t stop, he predicted, it won’t be long before we see “third, fourth, and fifth such assassination attempts.”
Back to attempt #1
Meanwhile, Valentine is concerned about the latest revelations surrounding the first attempt on Trump's life in July.
Senator Josh Hawley (R-Missouri) recently told the Fox News Channel that he was informed by a Secret Service whistleblower that the lead agent at the Butler, Pennsylvania rally on July 13 allegedly failed key training exams. Meanwhile the acting director of the agency met with lawmakers who were furious about the breakdown of communications and other mistakes.
"There is a methodology to the teaching and training there," Valentine explains to AFN, "and if this person didn't check all the boxes to be a lead advance [agent], then that would give me pause.
"I don't know what her background was or what her training was," he continues. "She could have gone to Washington, DC, and then back to Pittsburgh without ever doing the president's detail or the vice president's detail – which to me would put her in a position to maybe not be the best pick to be the lead."
And Valentine remains concerned about reports the Department of Homeland Security is an oppressive department where the Secret Service is not a priority – an environment he expects won't change.
"They've got their own priorities," he says, referring to DHS, which oversees the Secret Service. "It doesn't appear to be the border. [and] it doesn't appear to be the Secret Service. So. let's peel those things off and put them someplace where they have a chance to innovate, lead, and thrive – and be a success."
Valentine argues Secret Service should be back under the Treasury Department. "Under Treasury, we were allowed to pursue the best, to hire the best, to train them and then to continue that innovation. And under DHS, we just haven't."
