Donald Trump Recounts ‘Shots Being Fired’ While Golfing

Former President Donald Trump recounted the moment that he heard gunfire while golfing in southern Florida during one of his first speaking appearances since the apparent assassination attempt against him on Sunday.
Trump sat down with internet personality Farokh Sarmad for an interview streamed to X, formerly Twitter, to discuss the launch of a crypto platform that will be controlled by his two eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric. The interview comes a day after 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh was arrested in connection to the apparent assassination attempt against Trump while he was golfing at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Florida.
The former president said that he was golfing with friends, including real estate investor Steve Witkoff, when he “heard shots being fired in the air,” guessing that he heard “four or five.” Trump said that after the gunfire went off, the group got into golf carts and “moved along pretty, pretty good.”
“I was with an agent, and the agent did a fantastic job,” Trump added. He also praised the U.S. Secret Service for doing an “excellent job” responding to the threat, as another Secret Service agent saw a man sticking the barrel of a rifle through a bush-lined fence at the golf club. That agent shot at the suspect, who fled in a vehicle and was later taken into custody in a nearby county.
“You wouldn’t want to have somebody like that out there, you know,” Trump said referring to Routh, whom the former president also called a “dangerous person.”
Trump was unharmed. Routh did not fire any shots, never had Trump in his line of sight and sped away after an agent who spotted him shot in his direction, officials said.
Routh was arrested in a neighboring county and has been charged with possession of a firearm while a former felon and possession of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. Law enforcement officials recovered an AK-47, a GoPro camera and a backpack where Routh was spotted in the fence line.
Sunday’s arrest came roughly 60 days after the assassination attempt at Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13. That attack left Trump with an injury on the tip of his right ear, and two other rallygoers were injured by gunfire. One spectator, firefighter Corey Comperatore, was killed. The gunman was shot dead by a Secret Service countersniper.
Trump said earlier in the day during an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital that he blames the “rhetoric” of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris for both incidents. He repeated during his conversation with Sarmad on Monday, “There’s a lot of rhetoric.”
Newsweek reached out to Trump’s campaign for additional comment on Monday.
Biden said on Monday that America must work to end political violence. At the start of an address to the National HBCU Week Conference in Philadelphia, he said: “America has suffered too many times the tragedy of an assassin’s bullet…It solves nothing. It just tears the country apart. We must do everything we can to prevent it and never give it any oxygen.”
Harris said in a statement on Sunday: “I am deeply disturbed by the possible assassination attempt of former President Trump today…As we gather the facts, I will be clear: I condemn political violence. We all must do our part to ensure that this incident does not lead to more violence.”
Update 9/17/24 6:34 a.m. ET: This story was updated with additional information.