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Trump Safe After New Assassination Attempt, Suspect Arrested
A police officer gestures as they investigate reports of shots fired outside Republican presidential nominee and former US President Donald Trump’s Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach, Florida, US, Sept. 15, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Marco Bello
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump was safe on Sunday after the Secret Service foiled what the FBI called an apparent assassination attempt while he was golfing on his course in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Secret Service agents spotted and fired on a gunman in bushes near the property line of the golf course, a few hundred yards from where Trump was playing, law enforcement officials said.
The suspect left an AK-47-style assault rifle and other items at the scene and fled in a vehicle but was later arrested.
The apparent attempt on Trump‘s life came just two months after he was shot at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, sustaining a minor injury to his right ear.
Both incidents highlight the challenges of keeping presidential candidates safe in a hotly contested and polarized campaign with just over seven weeks to go before the Nov. 5 election.
It was not clear if or how the suspect knew Trump was playing golf at the time, but the attempted attack was sure to raise new questions about the level of protection he is given.
CNN, Fox News, and The New York Times identified the suspect as Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, of Hawaii, citing unnamed law enforcement officials. The FBI declined to comment and Reuters could not independently verify his identity.
Reuters found profiles on X, Facebook, and LinkedIn for a Ryan Routh who appeared to be the man identified as the suspect by those news organizations.
Reuters was not able to confirm these were the suspect’s accounts and law enforcement agencies declined to comment, but public access to the Facebook and X profiles was removed hours after the shooting.
The three accounts bearing Routh’s name suggest he was an avid supporter of Ukraine in its war against Russia. In several of the posts, he appeared to be trying to help recruit soldiers for Ukraine’s war effort.
GUN BARREL IN BUSHES
Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said Secret Service agents saw a rifle barrel poking out from bushes about 400 to 500 yards (365 to 460 meters) away from Trump as they cleared holes of potential threats ahead of his play.
The agents engaged the gunman, firing at least four rounds of ammunition around 1:30 pm (1730 GMT).
The gunman then dropped his rifle, and left behind two backpacks and other items, and fled in a black Nissan car. The sheriff said a witness saw the gunman and managed to take photos of his car and license plate before he escaped.
“The Secret Service did exactly what should have been done,” Bradshaw said, declining to identify the suspect or provide a possible motive.
After the suspect fled the scene, police sent out an alert to statewide agencies with the information on his vehicle, which led to sheriff’s deputies in neighboring Martin County apprehending the suspect on I-95 about 40 miles (65km) from the golf course.
Fox News presenter Sean Hannity said he’d spoken to both Trump and Steve Witkoff, a New York real estate investor and longtime Trump friend who was on the golf course with him on Sunday.
“They were on the fifth hole. And the way Steve described this, the way the president described it, they both had exactly the same story, which is that they heard pop pop, pop pop,” said Hannity. The Secret Service “pounced on the president, covered him,” he added.
Republican US Senator Lindsey Graham, in an interview with The New York Times, said he had spoken with Trump and the former president expressed gratitude for his Secret Service detail, adding that the president said, “These people are awesome.”
In response to a reporter’s question, officials acknowledged that because Trump is not in office, the full golf course was not cordoned off.
“If he was, we would have had the entire golf course surrounded,” Bradshaw said during Sunday’s briefing. “Because he’s not, security is limited to the areas that the Secret Service deems possible.”
Trump sent an email to supporters saying there were “gunshots in my vicinity, but before rumors start spiraling out of control, I wanted you to hear this first: I AM SAFE AND WELL!” according to an email seen by Reuters.
The White House said in a statement that President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris had been briefed about the incident and were relieved to know that he was safe.
Biden later said he had directed his team to ensure the Secret Service has the resources it needs to ensure Trump‘s safety, according to a statement released by the White House.
Trump is locked in a tight presidential election race with Harris, who has had a surge in the polls since replacing Biden as the Democratic Party’s candidate in July.
“Violence has no place in America,” Harris said in an X social media post.
On X in 2020, Routh expressed support for Democratic US presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and mocked Biden as “sleepy Joe.”
Earlier this year, Routh tagged Biden in a post on X: “@POTUS Your campaign should be called something like KADAF. Keep America democratic and free. Trumps should be MASA …make Americans slaves again master. DEMOCRACY is on the ballot and we cannot lose.”
Trump‘s running mate in the presidential election, US Senator JD Vance, said he spoke to Trump after the shooting and that the former president was in good spirits.
Trump was grazed in the right ear and one rallygoer was killed in the gunfire at the Pennsylvania rally on July 13. The gunman, identified as a 20-year-old Thomas Crooks, was shot and killed by a Secret Service sniper.
That was the first shooting of a US president or major party presidential candidate in more than four decades, and the glaring security lapse forced Kimberly Cheatle to resign as Secret Service director under bipartisan congressional pressure.
The Secret Service’s new acting director said in August that he was “ashamed” of the security lapse that led to the assassination attempt.
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Iran, US Task Experts to Design Framework for a Nuclear Deal, Tehran Says
Atomic symbol and USA and Iranian flags are seen in this illustration taken, September 8, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
Iran and the United States agreed on Saturday to task experts to start drawing up a framework for a potential nuclear deal, Iran’s foreign minister said, after a second round of talks following President Donald Trump’s threat of military action.
At their second indirect meeting in a week, Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi negotiated for almost four hours in Rome with Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, through an Omani official who shuttled messages between them.
Trump, who abandoned a 2015 nuclear pact between Tehran and world powers during his first term in 2018, has threatened to attack Iran unless it reaches a new deal swiftly that would prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon.
Iran, which says its nuclear program is peaceful, says it is willing to discuss limited curbs to its atomic work in return for lifting international sanctions.
Speaking on state TV after the talks, Araqchi described them as useful and conducted in a constructive atmosphere.
“We were able to make some progress on a number of principles and goals, and ultimately reached a better understanding,” he said.
“It was agreed that negotiations will continue and move into the next phase, in which expert-level meetings will begin on Wednesday in Oman. The experts will have the opportunity to start designing a framework for an agreement.”
The top negotiators would meet again in Oman next Saturday to “review the experts’ work and assess how closely it aligns with the principles of a potential agreement,” he added.
Echoing cautious comments last week from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, he added: “We cannot say for certain that we are optimistic. We are acting very cautiously. There is no reason either to be overly pessimistic.”
There was no immediate comment from the US side following the talks. Trump told reporters on Friday: “I’m for stopping Iran, very simply, from having a nuclear weapon. They can’t have a nuclear weapon. I want Iran to be great and prosperous and terrific.”
Washington’s ally Israel, which opposed the 2015 agreement with Iran that Trump abandoned in 2018, has not ruled out an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming months, according to an Israeli official and two other people familiar with the matter.
Since 2019, Iran has breached and far surpassed the 2015 deal’s limits on its uranium enrichment, producing stocks far above what the West says is necessary for a civilian energy program.
A senior Iranian official, who described Iran’s negotiating position on condition of anonymity on Friday, listed its red lines as never agreeing to dismantle its uranium enriching centrifuges, halt enrichment altogether or reduce its enriched uranium stockpile below levels agreed in the 2015 deal.
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Hamas Says Fate of US-Israeli Hostage Unknown After Guard Killed in Israel Strike
Varda Ben Baruch, the grandmother of Edan Alexander, 19, an Israeli army volunteer kidnapped by Hamas, attends a special Kabbalat Shabbat ceremony with families of other hostages, in Herzliya, Israel October 27, 2023 REUTERS/Kuba Stezycki
Hamas said on Saturday the fate of an Israeli dual national soldier believed to be the last US citizen held alive in Gaza was unknown, after the body of one of the guards who had been holding him was found killed by an Israeli strike.
A month after Israel abandoned the ceasefire with the resumption of intensive strikes across the breadth of Gaza, Israel was intensifying its attacks.
President Donald Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff said in March that freeing Edan Alexander, a 21-year-old New Jersey native who was serving in the Israeli army when he was captured during the Oct. 7, 2023 attacks that precipitated the war, was a “top priority.” His release was at the center of talks held between Hamas leaders and US negotiator Adam Boehler last month.
Hamas had said on Tuesday that it had lost contact with the militants holding Alexander after their location was hit in an Israeli attack. On Saturday it said the body of one of the guards had been recovered.
“The fate of the prisoner and the rest of the captors remains unknown,” said Hamas armed wing Al-Qassam Brigades’ spokesperson Abu Ubaida.
“We are trying to protect all the hostages and preserve their lives … but their lives are in danger because of the criminal bombings by the enemy’s army,” Abu Ubaida said.
The Israeli military did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Hamas released 38 hostages under the ceasefire that began on January 19. Fifty-nine are still believed to be held in Gaza, fewer than half of them still alive.
Israel put Gaza under a total blockade in March and restarted its assault on March 18 after talks failed to extend the ceasefire. Hamas says it will free remaining hostages only under an agreement that permanently ends the war; Israel says it will agree only to a temporary pause.
On Friday, the Israeli military said it hit about 40 targets across the enclave over the past day. The military on Saturday announced that a 35-year-old soldier had died in combat in Gaza.
NETANYAHU STATEMENT
Late on Thursday Khalil Al-Hayya, Hamas’ Gaza chief, said the movement was willing to swap all remaining 59 hostages for Palestinians jailed in Israel in return for an end to the war and reconstruction of Gaza.
He dismissed an Israeli offer, which includes a demand that Hamas lay down its arms, as imposing “impossible conditions.”
Israel has not responded formally to Al-Hayya’s comments, but ministers have said repeatedly that Hamas must be disarmed completely and can play no role in the future governance of Gaza. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to give a statement later on Saturday.
Hamas on Saturday also released an undated and edited video of Israeli hostage Elkana Bohbot. Hamas has released several videos over the course of the war of hostages begging to be released. Israeli officials have dismissed past videos as propaganda.
After the video was released, Bohbot’s family said in a statement that they were “deeply shocked and devastated,” and expressed concern for his mental and physical condition.
“How much longer will he be expected to wait and ‘stay strong’?” the family asked, urging for all of the 59 hostages who are still held in Gaza to be brought home.
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Oman’s Sultan to Meet Putin in Moscow After Iran-US Talks
FILE PHOTO: Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said gives a speech after being sworn in before the royal family council in Muscat, Oman January 11, 2020. Photo: REUTERS/Sultan Al Hasani/File Photo
Oman’s Sultan Haitham bin Tariq al-Said is set to visit Moscow on Monday, days after the start of a round of Muscat-mediated nuclear talks between the US and Iran.
The sultan will hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, the Kremlin said.
Iran and the US started a new round of nuclear talks in Rome on Saturday to resolve their decades-long standoff over Tehran’s atomic aims, under the shadow of President Donald Trump’s threat to unleash military action if diplomacy fails.
Ahead of Saturday’s talks, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi met his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Moscow. Following the meeting, Lavrov said Russia was “ready to assist, mediate and play any role that will be beneficial to Iran and the USA.”
Moscow has played a role in Iran’s nuclear negotiations in the past as a veto-wielding U.N. Security Council member and signatory to an earlier deal that Trump abandoned during his first term in 2018.
The sultan’s meetings in Moscow visit will focus on cooperation on regional and global issues, the Omani state news agency and the Kremlin said, without providing further detail.
The two leaders are also expected to discuss trade and economic ties, the Kremlin added.
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