The man accused of hiding in the bushes with an AK-47 and attempting to assassinate former President Donald Trump at his South Florida golf club is a former roofer whose criminal record includes barricading himself with a gun on the company’s North Carolina premises more than two decades ago.
Law enforcement sources told the Miami Herald on Sunday evening that the man arrested was Ryan Wesley Routh, 58. At around 1 p.m., officers and agents found an AK-47 with a scope, as well as two backpacks and a GoPro in bushes just outside Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach.
READ MORE: AK-47 found near Trump’s golf course in Florida. FBI calls incident an ‘assassination attempt’
The shooting came several months after Trump was grazed by a bullet in an assassination attempt at a rally in Pennsylvania. Routh, sources said, faces charges in federal court after being arrested along Interstate 95.
What we know about the suspected assassin:
Ryan Routh is not from Florida
It appears that Routh has no ties to Florida.
According to public records, Routh is originally from North Carolina. He attended North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, where he studied mechanical engineering, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Routh has been living in Hawaii since 2018. On the island, he opened Camp Box Honolulu, where, according to his LinkedIn profile, he used his construction experience to “build simple, low-cost structures to help combat the highest homelessness rate in the United States, a result of unprecedented gentrification.”
He is an independent voter
According to The News & Observer, a McClatchy publication in North Carolina, Routh remains listed as an active, unaffiliated voter in North Carolina.
READ MORE: North Carolina man arrested after attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump
Because unaffiliated voters can choose which state primary they wish to participate in, Routh voted in the Democratic primary when he cast his ballot this spring.
Was he a Trump supporter?
Routh, according to the New York Post and Archives of his X-Accountsaid he voted for Trump in 2016.
“I and the world hoped that President Trump would be different and better than the candidate, but we were all very disappointed and it appears you are getting worse and regressing; are you retarded? I will be glad when you are gone,” Routh posted.
Previous clashes with the law
In 2010, Routh was sentenced to prison on three counts of possession of stolen goods and to probation on one count of misdemeanor of the same crime, according to the North Carolina Department of Adult Correction website.
A December 16, 2002, article in The News & Record, a Greensboro, North Carolina newspaper, said Routh was arrested after he drove away from a traffic stop at 10 p.m. and barricaded himself with a fully automatic machine gun at United Roofing, where Routh worked, according to public records. He was arrested three hours later.
At his sentencing, the charges of carrying a concealed weapon, driving without a license and resisting an officer were combined with other charges from 2001 and 2002: five additional counts of driving without a license, two additional counts of carrying a concealed weapon, hit and run and other “miscellaneous traffic violations.”
Did he volunteer to fight in the Ukraine war?
In 2023, Routh told the New York Times that he spent several months in Ukraine during the war with Russia. He also said he tried to recruit Afghan soldiers who opposed the Taliban to fight in Ukraine.
Miami Herald editor Jay Weaver contributed to this report
