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I'm Aaron Gilchrist and we begin with breaking news in the apparent second assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump. At any moment now, we expect the FBI, Secret Service and Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office to hold a news conference. You're looking at live pictures from where that will be happening. They're gonna brief us on the investigation after authorities say a Secret Service agent fired on a would be assassin hiding in the bushes outside former President Trump's golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida.
Yesterday after Now ABC News was first to obtain a new angle of the arrest as the suspect was arrested along a highway after he'd run from the golf club. Two steps to your right. Two steps to your right. Driver, walk straight back.
Keep walking. Ryan Ruth appeared in court earlier today charged with two federal counts, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. He's expected to face additional charges as well. Now, according to authorities and to do criminal complaints, Ruth was armed with a loaded rifle with a scope just a few hundred yards from where Mr.
Trump was golfing at his Florida club yesterday. According to phone records, the suspect had been waiting in that area nearly 12 hours when an agent noticed a rifle through the bushes. They opened fire and Mr. Trump was rushed to safety.
Now, officials say as he ran, Ruth left behind his weapon, a digital camera, a backpack and a bag of food. The 58 year old suspect has faced more than 100 criminal charges in the past, including a conviction for possessing a machine gun. In interviews and posts on social media, he's described himself as a disillusioned former Trump supporter and a vocal supporter of Ukraine, although, although Ruth's motives are not yet known. The former president today blamed his political rivals Kamala Harris and Joe Biden for this incident, telling Fox News Digital, quote, their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at.
And later posted on social media that because of their rhetoric, quote, the bullets are flying and it will only get worse. Vice President Harris released a statement saying in part, quote, I condemn political violence. We all must do our part to ensure that this incident does not lead to more violence. And President Biden also condemned the attack a short time ago.
On camera this was during an event in Philadelphia. Let me just say there's no. And I mean this in the bottom of those, you know me, many of you do no place in political violence. For political violence.
America, none, zero, never. I've always condemned political violence. I always love in America. In America, we resolve our difference peacefully.
The battle box, not the end of a gun. America suffered too many times the tragedy of an assassin's bullet, it solves nothing and just tears the country apart. Must do everything we can to prevent it and never give it any oxygen. Joining me now from West Palm beach is NBC's Garrett Hake, Tom Winter with us as well as Robert McDonald, retired supervisory special agent for the U.S.
secret Service. Garrett, I want to start with you and obviously as soon as this news conference gets started behind you, we will go to the speakers at the podium. I know we've heard from former President Trump both on social media and in interviews, reacting to this apparent assassination attempt. Broadly, this is different from what we've heard from him in the past.
In the wake of that July attempt on his life. How is he viewing this incident versus the last attempt back in July? Yeah, Aaron, in this case, the former president skipped right over. Was that introspective period following the first assassination attempt that calls for unity that we saw at the Republican National Convention.
Now, the president is just angry. We see it in his social media post and we hear it in one or two interviews that he has given thus far, blaming this a second attempt on the rhetoric of the vice president and President Biden lashing out. We're seeing from his campaign the calls from Harris and Biden to denounce those in the Democratic Party who suggested that Donald Trump is a threat to democracy. No calls for unity here, no kind of broader message of tuning things, turning things down.
Across the country, it's anger and focus on the top of the Democratic ticket from Donald Trump. So, Gary, I know this incident yesterday obviously was not a campaign event. This was the former president out doing what he normally does, out golfing. Wasn't something the public would have been aware of.
Is the campaign shifting plans at all as a result of what's happened, what happened yesterday in Florida? Lauren, in terms of their official public schedule, the answer is no. The campaign's been very clear that Donald Trump's gonna continue with this campaign events this week. He's out Town hall of Michigan tomorrow.
His event tonight, Mar a Lago, has nothing to do with the campaign. He's launching a new crypto program just for his own personal brand. All of that is the show must go on. But what changes might be being made to the security posture around some of the offense or how things like the rest of the former president's schedule, like a golf outing, which is typically treated as we call an OTR movement, a lot less of the visible security preparations, the security screenings, a smaller package of Secret Service that officials traveling around him.
If those changes are being made, we don't know about them yet and we may not ever be told about them. The Secret Service may simply decide to make those changes unilaterally and quietly, which is something we would expect from the Secret Service here. Hey. For us in Florida to take care.
Thank you. I want to start to Tom Winter. Now, Tom, you've obviously been following this from law enforcement perspective, which we're able to gather from your sources. What do we expect to hear at this news conference starting a couple of this year?
Well, that's right. I think we'll get an update on the investigative efforts so far. The FBI very active right now in the Palm beach community, particularly near with this golf course, going around and getting surveillance video, canvassing the area for that video and putting it all together, according to our team that's on the ground there. What I anticipate we'll get an update on is if they anticipate further charges down the line, if this individual has said anything, if they're any closer to a motive, and then address the question about whether or not this individual had any communications with anybody overseas.
To be clear, I have not heard that. But that's the type of thing at this point that they would have some sort of communications or some sort of a sense of what those communications were and then any details about how this may go from here. I know they're starting to assemble. It's possible we have asked for it under Florida public records laws to get access to some more of the video that the police may have had, as well as any messages.
I'm Eric Gilpurst. You've been watching NBC News special reports on the apparent second assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump. And moments ago, authorities updated reporters on their investigation. You saw that here live.
Among the developments there, the acting Secret Service director, Ron Rowe says the suspect here, Ryan Ruth, was never able to fire a shot before he ran from Mr. Trump's golf club. Now he took off after a Secret Service agent spotted him and fired at him. That agent was well advanced, we're told, hundreds of yards from where Mr.
Trump was golfing at that moment. Investigators also say that they've attempted to interview the suspect, but he invoked his right to an attorney now, the acting Secret Service director also saying that his agency needed what he called a paradigm shift in its procedures to keep his protectees safe and that the threat environment facing them was, quote, unprecedented. Now, as we mentioned earlier, Ruth was charged with two federal counts, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. He is expected to face additional charges as well.
Joining me now is NBC News Homeland Security correspondent Julia Ainsley. Also back with us, Robert McDonald, retired supervisory special agent from the U.S. secret Service. Julia, I'll start with you here.
This notion that the Secret Service director said he ordered a paradigm shift after the July 13 incident involving the former president. What stood out to you in the remarks that we heard today from these law enforcement leaders? Yeah, you're right, Aaron. The acting director wrote is not shy away from really strong language.
It's similar to what he said between House before House and Senate committees after the July 13 incident when he took the helm of the Secret Service after former Director Kimberly Sheadle left in the aftermath of that incident, that he wants a big shift in the way Secret Service handles security because of what he calls the dynamic threat environment they're living in now. But there are two things, Aaron, that he did not directly answer. I want to flag those. One is that he said that there were counter unmanned aerial systems, which means ways to counter drones.
Now, that's different from what he said before Senate committees that he wanted to increase drone surveillance. So it's unclear. There's no question about whether or not drones were actually used at this golf course, even though he said they were going to start that has that program started specifically for Trump? Because that would have been a way they could have seen this shooter or attempted shooter, as we know now, he was in the area for 12 hours.
Could this have been prevented earlier if they had used aerial surveillance? That's a big question. Another thing is when we heard Garrett Haig say, did the Trump campaign ask for more, for more security and what are you going to do about that? He just kept saying they have the highest level and you know, we're going to always reevaluate the threat.
But as we reported here at ABC just in the last couple hours, we understand the Trump campaign as of this morning did ask a Secret Service specifically acting director wrote for more security. Given the fact that this is now the second assassination attempt on Trump. Of course they're now, of course Trump is coming out and applauding Secret Service for their response. But there is a sense that when you have Two incidents like these, maybe it's time to increase security.
Now I have been told that they're already raised. They've already raised a security far pass rate was on July 13th. You have to think about their other responsibilities, the other protectives including the current president of the United States and Harris as she campaigns as well and the vice presidential candidates and others. And they're also preparing for the United Nations General assembly next week in New York.
But essentially this could turn into a wider conversation, Aaron, in which Congress would need to step in and appropriate more funding for the Secret Service if they are going to get to the level that the Trump campaign wants and potentially what Roe wants when he talks about that paradigm shift. Oh, do we all ask you same about. I want to turn to Robert McDonald, former retired Secret Service supervisory agents. Bobby, just your perspective on this to hear the Secret Service director.
One, we don't typically hear this much from a Secret Service director and he laid out a fair amount of detail that isn't typically something the public is able to consume. But he also said that he wanted to move from a reactive model to a readiness model, which I thought was striking. How do you hear that from the director of Secret Service? Yeah.
Good afternoon, Aaron. Great to be with you again. You're absolutely right. We don't normally hear from the director of the Secret Service.
And quite frankly, one of the issues that was the impetus of the downfall of former Director Cheado was that she didn't participate in the press conference after Butler. I think it was very impressive today to see the acting director out, showing some leadership, leading from the front, letting his troops know that the men and women of the Secret Service are going to be looked after by him and he's going to support the work that they're doing every day. You know, as he said, we just had the rnc, we just had the dnc, you got the UN General assembly, which is going to be going on up in New York in the next week or so with 150 to 190 foreign heads of state. And then we've got the home stretch to the election time.
So yes, we've got 40 protectees that the Service takes care of. It is time to shift I think a little bit of that paradigm. He is correct that the tried and true methods and policies of the Secret Service do work and they did work yesterday. But I think it is also time to reboot and reset a little bit to maybe be a little bit more proactive than reactive, as he mentioned in his statement.
So what do you mean by that more proactive than reactive. In an instance like this, there is an element of policing that we know, law enforcement activity that we know is reactive. But there is some things that can be done proactively or ahead of time, if you will. In this instance, when we're looking at protecting a former president, Joey, by using Secret Service protecting, what do you mean by being more proactive?
What would that look like? What could that look like? What could have been done differently here from your perspective? Yeah, I think what we're talking about here is we want to augment the protected advance process.
The protected advance process in Butler was a huge failure 60 days ago. And we saw where the gaps were in that communication process, in the liaison with the local police departments and where things just went wrong. And several things went wrong in that situation. We then had very poor messaging that came out after that.
A lack of transparency and why things happened, why those agents weren't put on administrative leave a little bit sooner after going through a catastrophic event like that. So a lot of questions are asked there. And I think the Secret Service needs to use these incidents that have happened to better themselves. As he just said, we have to have a no fail mission every day.
So the fact is that at certain times we're going to have to be reactive if something happens. But we need to be proactive. We need to go out and be on offense rather than defense. In the course of our protective measures every day, as I said, we got a little detail from the Secret Service director that we don't typically get.
He talked about having increased assets on the ground. He walked us through the layered approach that the agents were taking on that golf course with a front layer moving several holes ahead of where Mr. Trump was playing golf. And we were able to learn earlier today that the security apparatus included counter assault, counter surveillance, counter sniper teams, as well as protective intelligence unit, a drone contingent in addition to the personal protective detail there.
To your mind, given that this was an off the record movement, not one that would have been publicly known, and you and I understand the difference between those two sorts of things, an off the record movement is by its nature slightly more safe than something that might be publicly known. What's your read on the apparatus that was around former President Trump at that moment? Appropriate? Not enough.
Did everything go exactly as it should go in this instance? Well, in your typical off the record movement, as you mentioned, you know, it's whether it's to a golf course or an ice cream shop or whatever, if the Secret Service and the protective staff doesn't know until 30 minutes before that event takes place. It's really tough for the bad guy to know that that event is going to take place. So the question I have here is how did this individual know enough to secrete himself into the woods area or the public area just outside the fence some 12 hours before the former president happened to be at that golf course?
The layered approach that he mentioned works here, the floating bubble, if you will, of agents out ahead, agents with the president at the hole he's playing, and then agents on the backside works. Kudos to that officer or that agent who was out ahead and saw that rifle barrel coming out of the woods or coming out of the fence line to be able to react. That individual was doing exactly what they're doing. We've been talking about the lead up to Butler and perhaps the Secret Service had got a little complacent with its protective advance measures.
That guy gal did their job yesterday and they did it well. They then engaged the shooter and he was able to get away and with the help of a wonderful citizen was able to get that information out. Secret Service is not going to chase after that guy. They're going to be worried about protecting the former president.
And the communication and liaison apparatus that was in place there yesterday was worked perfectly to get that individual, albeit 45 miles of I95, which is very close to that golf course and very easy for him to get to. So again, all things considered, a very positive day all the way around by Secret Service and other state, local and federal partners. All right, thank you for that. Julia.
Very quickly, before I let you go, that the question has been asked about whether this is an issue of resources, funding or an allocation of resources, as we heard the Secret House suggest earlier today. Do we have any understanding of politically here in Washington what a next move might be as this investigation continues to roll out of Florida? There are rumblings behind the scenes, particularly amongst appropriators on the Hill right now that could be looking at providing more funding to Secret Service. The key thing though is it takes about two years to onboard people with the level that you would need in order for them to go through the hiring process, the background process and be trained, especially if they're in a really high position like a counter sniper position or someone who could be very close to a protectee like Trump.
So time might not be on their side even if they have their money. What we see time and time again is the Secret Service pulling from other agencies, namely Homeland Security investigations. We know, for example, next week where the UN General assembly gets underway, they'll have between 1500 and 2000 of those agents just to provide extra help. And of course, as we saw today, they also depend on local law enforcement.
But this could be something that we hear more discussions about on the Hill. As we heard today from the acting director, they're doing just about as much as they can, he says, with the resources they currently have available. All right, Julie ainsley and Robert McDonald, thank you both for that. Now, as I said, the the acting Secret Service director said this is an unprecedented threat environment that we're in.
And join me now to talk a little bit more about the unprecedented political environment we're in. Daniela Diaz, congressional reporter for Polito, Megan Hayes, former special assistant to President Jo Biden on his communications team. And Brendan Buck, former advisor to Republican House Speakers Paul Ryan and John Boehner. He's also an NBC News political analyst.
And Danielle, I'll start with you here. Obviously, the investigation is just starting. We heard from former President Trump blaming the language from President Biden, from Vice President Harris for inspiring a would be attacker here. It took a few weeks to get that sort of messaging coming from the last assassination attempt.
Do you have a sense of how that language is landing at this point? Well, I know how the investigation is going on in Capitol Hill right now. And this all began with the first assassination attempt when they launched this task force to investigate how they're going. What led to the first assassination attempt failure versus Secret Service that led to Trump getting shot at it in Butler, Pennsylvania.
But there are a lot of questions still about whether this rhetoric is actually affecting or triggering people to try to kill Donald Trump. There's a lot of questions surrounding this, which is why this investigation is still playing out. And that is what lawmakers want to see as they continue their investigation to see if they can get these questions answered. So, Brendan, I'll turn you here.
It's sort of the same question as we look at some of the language that's being used, the accusations being made at this point, the four president accusing Democrats of using inflammatory rhetoric and inspired the shooter. We can't help but to note that we've heard things from the four presidents as recently as this morning. He told fox, quote, their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at when I am the one who's going to save the country. And they're the ones that are destroying the country both from inside and out.
These are people that want to destroy our country. It's called the enemy within. They are the real threat. What's your take on this situation and the worst that are being used to address it from people who are run for public health?
Yeah, obviously very different response. Remember last time it was all about unity. Anyone come together and rise above. And obviously we're getting none of that.
And of course, Donald Trump, no stranger himself, using out there at the language. The important thing is we have no idea what any language had anything to do with this guy's actions. Yet. The reality is that, you know, I work for a lot of high ranking people.
It can be scary these days when you're in public high office. There are a lot of people out there who don't hear what people say politically in a rational way. They may not be all there together. We don't know what the mental status of this person was.
You have to worry about that person who's not hearing things like, oh, they understand that's just a phrase that people use. They may hear things more literally now. We don't know whether this person has anything to do with that. But it's just a reminder that there are people out there who don't hear things the same way that all of us do.
Strategically, obviously we heard from the president, the vice president last night suggesting, yeah, this sort of violence is not tolerable. Right. And then we hear the statements that we heard from president today. You run the campaign.
Do you respond? How do you respond? What's the right action in this moment if you're a Democrat who wants to win office, who has to sort of push back on some things. Look, I think the president, vice president and the vice president this moment, not a candidate for president, vice president.
So they are making it known that political violence has no place in our, in our system. They don't think that the rhetoric thing want to come down. The rhetoric, they are making that very clear to everyone. But also the vice president is still running a campaign.
Do you think that everyone needs to turn down language? Yes, absolutely. To the vice president and former President Trump? Yes.
But I think that what the president and the vice president have put out today are looking to be narrow leaders of this country and they are showing leadership here. You've been inside the bubble as we've been listening to the Secret Service director talk about some of the things that they've done. You've traveled with president, with the president and been a part of that security movement. What's your take on what we heard from the Secret Service director and what concerns still exist?
I think they are doing what he's doing. The layer approach is really what happens on the ground. There's a lot of things that staff don't know what they want behind the scenes. When you are out with the president, it can be unsafe here when people, you don't know what people who are on, what their intentions are, what they're feeling, but they are doing everything they can.
Are they under resourced? Of course they are. Do they rely on local and other law enforcement partners? Yes, absolutely.
I think the Secret Service right now is doing everything that they can. Sorry we had so little time to talk today, but thank you. I appreciate you, appreciate you all being here with us. We are back with more MEET THE PRESS now tomorrow, of course, the news continues right now with Hallie Jackson.