Ryan Routh charged with attempted murder of Donald Trump: NPR

MIAMI — Ryan Routh has been charged with attempted murder of former President Donald Trump following an incident at Trump's golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sept. 15.

A grand jury in Miami issued an indictment late Tuesday. The indictment adds three new counts to the weapons charges for which Routh is currently incarcerated. In addition to the attempted murder of a presidential candidate, he is accused of possessing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence and assaulting a federal officer – the Secret Service agent who spotted him earlier this month loitering in the tree line outside former President Trump's West Palm Beach Golf Club.

The maximum penalty for attempted murder is life imprisonment.

Routh had previously been charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and obscuring the serial number of a firearm.

“Violence against public officials threatens everything our country stands for, and the Department of Justice will use every tool available to hold Ryan Routh accountable for the attempted murder of former President Trump as charged in the indictment,” said U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland.

In a court filing and a hearing Monday, authorities said Routh's cellphone records showed he waited outside the fence of Trump's golf course for nearly 12 hours on Sept. 15. While Trump was playing, a Secret Service agent scanning a hole in front of the Republican presidential candidate spotted the muzzle of a rifle pointed in his direction. The agent opened fire, and prosecutors say Routh fled and was caught on a nearby highway. Authorities say Routh never fired the weapon.

Investigators later determined that Routh had allegedly arrived in Florida a month before the incident and, according to cellphone records, spent some time scouting both the golf course and Trump's Mar-a-Lago home. Prosecutors also revealed a letter Routh apparently wrote months before the incident in which he stated he wanted to assassinate Donald Trump.

The case was assigned to federal judge Aileen Cannon, who was appointed during the Trump administration. She is the same judge who presided over the trial over the former president's classified documents from Mar-a-Lago, brought by special counsel Jack Smith. She dismissed the case after several rulings in which she was widely criticized. The special counsel has appealed her decision.

Cannon's appointment as head of the Routh case was arbitrary.

Earlier this week, Donald Trump complained that the federal government should not have jurisdiction over Routh's prosecution because other federal cases against the former president are pending. He demanded that the state of Florida lead the prosecution – something Governor Ron DeSantis called for last week during a press conference, saying the federal government has a conflict of interest.