Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Tuesday the state has the jurisdiction to prosecute Ryan Wesley Routh for attempted murder and will be more transparent in its investigation than the federal government.
Routh raised an assault-style rifle as former President Donald Trump golfed on Sunday. Routh is the subject of three assassination investigations and could face life in prison if convicted for attempted murder.
“I think the Florida agencies from local on up have an opportunity to do a thorough investigation and then to provide the truth about what’s happening or what happened or how this came to be,” DeSantis said at a news conference in West Palm Beach. “People deserve the truth. I think we have two significant interests: Holding him accountable and then delivering the truth about how this could’ve happened.”
Routh appeared in a federal courtroom in Florida on Monday, charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. He has a court-appointed lawyer.
Routh, resident of North Carolina and Hawaii according to voting registrations, did not fire shots; U.S. Secret Service did fire at the suspect. He fled in an SUV and was later stopped and arrested.
Trump survived being hit by a bullet in an assassination attempt in Butler, Pa., on July 13. Thomas Crooks, the shooter, was killed. One participant at the rally was also killed by Crooks’ shots.
DeSantis, two-term Republican governor and former presidential candidate, also said that transparency in the investigation was important for public confidence in law enforcement.
“I’m not looking to blame this person or that person,” DeSantis said. “We just want to get the facts. You look at this guy’s rap sheet. How the heck did he end up in West Palm Beach in those bushes? People deserve the truth about that. They need to know his associations, his motivations, his ideology.”
DeSantis said he ordered the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to save his social media posts before they were taken down and that agents are already examining the archived posts.
“I think back on what happened in Las Vegas, six, seven years ago,” DeSantis said, referring to the Route 91 Harvest music festival on Oct. 1, 2017. “We never got any answers about that. I think back about what happened in Butler, Pennsylvania and we’ve not gotten very many answers on that. I think that really erodes public confidence.”
Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody criticized some of the anti-Trump rhetoric from Democrats and said President Joe Biden needs to be “in the details and formulating a plan” when it comes to improving the Secret Service’s protection mission. Trump and Biden discussed Secret Service protection by phone on Monday.
“This is unprecedented to have this much focus on a presidential nominee with the type of rhetoric and threats coming out of the mouths of so many people,” Moody said. “It was really disappointing to hear the president say that President Trump needs to be put in a bull’s eye just days before the first assassination attempt and then, weeks later at the DNC, say that threat was very much alive.”
She also said it was common for state prosecutors and law enforcement agents to work with federal prosecutors and agents on dual prosecutorial tracks with different purposes.
Since criminal allegations against the 58-year-old Routh crossed several county lines and judicial districts, DeSantis said that a statewide prosecutor will take the lead on the case for the state.
DeSantis also said that he knew immediately on Sunday morning where on the golf course the attempted assassination took place. DeSantis said when he played a round at Trump International Golf Club, he noticed the area between the No. 5 green and the No. 6 tee box was the “soft underbelly” for security there.
Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said he hopes Routh is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and that Trump’s Mar-A-Lago home was at the highest level of security.
Routh was arrested on Interstate 95 after fleeing the scene. DeSantis said an alert citizen wrote down Routh’s license plate number and that assisted law enforcement officers in making the arrest a few hours later.
Routh was poking a semiautomatic rifle with a scope through a fence at Trump’s golf course. An arrest affadavit unsealed Monday confirmed the suspect waited nearly 12 hours in the bushes with his rifle, two backpacks and a GoPro camera.
