As you know (or should know) there was a second assassination attempt of President Trump yesterday. I held off writing anything about it until I had some actual facts in hand. Welp, some of those facts are in hand and here’s what we know so far.
The Setup
Trump took an unscheduled day off from the campaign and went to Mar-A-Lago for the weekend. He decided to play a round of golf some time late Sunday morning.
Shortly before 1400 yesterday, USSS agents on Trump’s detail noticed the barrel of a long gun poking through the fence surrounding the Trump gold course in Palm Beach. This happened at the 6th hole while Trump was approaching the green at the 5th. The agents exchanged shots with the shooter who escaped and drove off.
A passerby noted the licence plate number and gave it to local law enforcement. A BOLO was issued and the vehicle was spotted and stopped in neighboring Martin County. The shooter was taken into custody and is in the Palm Beach County jail.
A press conference was held by the Palm Beach County authorities.
The shooter used a scoped AK pattern rifle – It looks to this editor to be a Norinco 386 Sporter – and had hung bags with ceramic tiles around his hide. He also had a GoPro mounted to the fence.
The Shooter
The shooter, who we will not be naming here, is a lefty, a convicted felon, and oddly, has been featured in several large media outlets for his support of Ukraine and Taiwan.
His criminal history in North Carolina includes convictions between 2002 and 2010 of possession of weapons of mass destruction, carrying a concealed gun, hit and run, possession of stolen goods and resisting law enforcement, among other charges. The weapons of mass destruction charge stems from an incident where he barricaded himself inside United Roofing and then faced charges including having a “weapon of mass destruction” because they said he had a “fully automatic machine gun.”
He made 19 donations to ActBlue since 2019, including for individual 2020 Democratic presidential primary candidates including former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-TX), Andrew Yang, Tom Steyer, and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA).
A Few odds and ends
Big props to Martin Co. Sheriff William Snyder. He released the name of the shooter before the feds could intervene and get his socials scrubbed.
It’s beginning to look like Florida law enforcement is going to be doing their own investigation into the assassination attempt and the shooter. Governor DeSantis made a statement to that effect last night.
Now, I have a few questions about this whole thing. I’m sure there will be more later on, but lets start with these;
- How did the shooter know Trump was going golfing?
- Did he have inside information?
- How did he get that close?
- What motivated the shooter?
Will we get the answers? I sure hope so, but I’m not holding my breath. We still don’t know squat about the previous assassin.