Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, has been identified as the man who was arrested in the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump. The suspect called Mr. Trump a threat to democracy.
According to authorities, he was spotted by Secret Service agents Sunday in the bushes outside Mr. Trump’s golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Officials said they found two backpacks, a GoPro camera, and an AK-47-style rifle with a scope where Mr. Routh was hiding. He fled in a black SUV but was located and detained after a witness gave police the vehicle tags.
According to his LinkedIn account, he owns Camp Box Honolulu, a shed-building company that opened in 2018.
He attended North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University from 1995 to 1998, where he studied mechanical engineering, his page says.
On his X account, his bio says he feels “lucky to have been born in America, with freedom and opportunity and hope that I do not waste such a valuable thing; to do more and take less.”
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On his account, he frequently derided Mr. Trump and described the 2024 election as a referendum on democracy — one of the central claims of President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in their Democratic presidential campaigns.
“Your campaign should be called something like KADAF. Keep America democratic and free. Trump’s should be MASA … make Americans slaves again master,” he said in one post in which he tagged Mr. Biden’s official @POTUS account.
“DEMOCRACY is on the ballot and we cannot lose. We cannot afford to fail. The world is counting on us to show the way,” the post from April 22 concludes.
He also criticized celebrities like musician Bruno Mars and often accused Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris of being insufficiently strong, especially on foreign policy.
Many of his X posts focus on helping Ukraine. In one, he tagged X owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk and asked him whether he could purchase a rocket.
“I would like to buy a rocket from you. I wish to load it with a warhead for Putin’s Black Sea mansion bunker to end him. Can you give me a price please. It can be old and used as not returning,” Mr. Routh wrote.
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A March 2022 post directed toward Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he was willing to “fly to Krakow and go to the border of Ukraine to volunteer and fight and die.”
Another said the leader should “ask Congress to put all American military on paid leave — so they can fight as civilians in Ukraine.”
Posts from April 2022 said he was in Kyiv and wanted to “create a tent city of all the foreigners here.”
He is also a supporter of Taiwan, according to his posts, including one that said he wants “to give Taiwan thousands of Nato trained Afghan soldiers.”
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.
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