Ryan Wesley Routh, the man suspected of carrying out the second assassination attempt on Donald Trump, has experienced fluctuating political beliefs that elude partisan definition.
Records show that Rouse, a 58-year-old former roofing contractor, had made small donations to Democratic candidates in recent years but acknowledged voting for Trump in the 2016 election and then embarked on an ideological journey whose aims appeared incoherent and confused.
He vehemently abandoned his earlier support for Trump after finding a worthy cause: recruiting former Afghan fighters to fight in the war on Ukraine’s side.
In a book, likely self-published in 2023, a man by the same name as Routh lays out his views on Ukraine and other issues, including the collapse of the Western nuclear deal with Iran, in which he blames himself for helping to elect a “stupid” president and calls on Iran to “assassinate Trump and me for our poor judgment and our destruction of the deal.”
But that doesn’t paint the full picture of Routh’s political ups and downs. In 2020, he endorsed then-Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard’s presidential bid in a series of Twitter posts. Gabbard is now a staunch Trump supporter and ally who helped prepare the former president for his recent presidential debate with Kamala Harris. Gabbard wrote that she would “vigorously pursue peace negotiations in Syria, Afghanistan and all places in turmoil.”
He appears to have voted for Joe Biden in the subsequent election — as of Sunday his car outside his Hawaii home had a “Biden-Harris” bumper sticker on it, though it’s unclear when in the past four years it was placed there — but by January 2024 he was supporting the idea of a Republican candidate run by Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy to run against Trump.
Rouse’s political prickliness was also on display in 2020 when he invited North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un (whom he described as “very intelligent and cultured”) to Hawaii, offering him the role of “ambassador and liaison” in the dispute with the U.S. He also invited pro-democracy protesters from Hong Kong to Hawaii, offering them free lodging, to protest against mainland China’s hardline policies.
Somewhat incongruously, his WhatsApp profile read: “Each of us must take small steps every day to support human rights, freedom and democracy. Each of us must help the Chinese people.”
Routh’s volatile political views likely reflect a turbulent personal past.
Shortly after the Russian invasion in 2022, he traveled to Ukraine to volunteer for the “International Brigade” of foreign fighters. He told The Guardian at the time that he expected to be rejected because he had no military experience, and that appears to have been the case. Instead, he announced plans to plant the flags of all the countries in the world in central Kiev and form a human chain around it declaring, “Putin, I’m here.” He calculated that if Russia bombed the international protests, it would spark global action.
According to CNN, Routh has been arrested at least eight times, including in 2002 when he was stopped by traffic police in his hometown of Greensboro, North Carolina, who found a concealed gun in his car and charged him with possession of a weapon of mass destruction.
According to local media reports, the suspect fled the scene and drove to a roofing business where he barricaded himself in for three hours. He was later charged with possession of a fully automatic machine gun, which court documents call a “weapon of mass destruction,” carrying a concealed weapon, driving without a valid driver’s license and resisting, delaying or obstructing law enforcement.
Prosecuting officer Tracy Fulk told Wired that Routh was known to police at the time of his arrest and that she assumed he was “dead or in jail” by now, adding that she had no idea he had moved on and was continuing his shenanigans.
Describing the night of her arrest in 2002, she continued, “One night, I noticed him in his car. I knew he didn’t have a driver’s license, so I pulled him over in front of a roofing shop. He pulled over, and as I approached his truck, he pulled a bag out from the center of the seat, and I saw a gun.
“So of course I pulled my gun out and started saying, ‘Hey! Show me your hands! Show me your hands!’ And he just parked in his driveway and ran into his house. We ended up calling in (the special response team) and there was a violent standoff for a couple hours before they went in and arrested him.”
Routh avoided prison time in the case because the judge imposed a suspended sentence and probation order.
Tina Cooper, 58, a former employee at a roofing company in Louth, told The Independent that her ex-boss was known locally for “doing stupid things”.
“He was threatening to blow up the entire Greensboro Police Department. It’s all documented in the police report,” Cooper said.
Routh wasn’t always on the wrong side of the law: In 1991, at age 25, he was designated a “Super Citizen” and awarded a Law Enforcement Oscar by the Greensboro chapter of the International Union of Police Associations for helping protect a woman from a suspected rapist, according to The Washington Post.
In a 2022 interview at the Ukrainian border, Rouse said he had quit his job at a construction company in Hawaii to “tie up all the loose ends to get out of town.” “They can take care of themselves. They don’t need a dad anymore,” he said of his wife and three children, then in their 20s. Rouse insisted that the trip to Ukraine was a “one-way ticket,” but then returned to the United States.
At least one loyalty was clear to him, as he explained to the Guardian why he was always seen draped with the American flag while in Ukraine: “If the Russians are going to kill me, I want to make sure they know who they’re going to kill,” he said.
“I am American.”
