Ukraine distanced itself from a man who had said he’d fight and “die” on Kyiv’s behalf — and was arrested in connection with an alleged assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump on Sunday, according to multiple reports.
The would-be assassin, 58-year-old Ryan Routh, was taken into custody by authorities after being spotted hiding with a rifle near the golf course Trump was playing at in Florida, in an alleged assassination plot against the former president. Routh has a history of presenting himself as someone who was directly involved in the Russia-Ukraine war, but Kyiv has denied any affiliation and said his ideas are “delusional,” according to The New York Times.
Routh had made public social media statements in recent years expressing his support for Ukraine’s defense against Russia and visited Ukraine in 2022, according to a review of public records by CNN. He portrayed himself as a Ukrainian military official and attempted to recruit Afghans via Facebook to go fight in the war.
“I AM WILLING TO FLY TO KRAKOW AND GO TO THE BORDER OF UKRAINE TO VOLUNTEER AND FIGHT AND DIE,” Routh wrote in a post on X (formerly Twitter) in 2022, according to the Times.
A Ukrainian foreign legion representative told CNN that Routh had contacted Kyiv several times but never served in the war or was tapped for a government role.
“The best way to describe his messages is – delusional ideas,” Oleksandr Shaguri, an officer of the Foreigners Coordination Department of the Land Forces Command, told CNN. “He was offering us large numbers of recruits from different countries but it was obvious to us his offers were not realistic. We didn’t even answer, there was nothing to answer to. He was never part of the Legion and didn’t cooperate with us in any way.”
Ukraine’s foreign volunteer Army also confirmed that they were uninvolved with Routh.
“American citizen Ryan Routh has never served in the International Legion and has no relation to the unit. Rumors disseminated in certain media are not true,” Ukraine’s International Legion said in a statement.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy voiced his relief that Trump was unharmed in the plot in a statement on Monday. “It’s good that the suspect in the assassination attempt was apprehended quickly,” he noted.
Questions continue to surround Routh. He claimed in a 2020 social media post that he had voted for Trump in 2016, but had allegedly been critical of the former president in recent years and had donated $100 to ActBlue, a Democratic fundraising platform, in 2020.
Trump was golfing in West Palm Beach when Secret Service agents noticed Routh hiding in shrubbery on the course ahead, according to The Associated Press. He attempted to flee but was quickly arrested; it wasn’t clear whether he had discharged his weapon, an AK-47, during the incident.
Routh is the second person to attempt to assassinate Trump, the first being 20-year-old Thomas Crooks, who shot at the president during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania in July. Secret Service, which was already under intense scrutiny for failing to prevent the first assassination attempt, is likely to fall back under a critical spotlight for not seeing or apprehending Routh earlier.
(Featured Image Media Credit: Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz)
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