Routh appears to have written a self-published book in which he wrote to Iran: ‘You are free to assassinate Trump.’ Just three weeks ago, Susan Crabtree — perhaps the best reporter on the Secret Service in America — reported: ‘Some U.S. national security officials believe that the agencies charged with protecting the security of presidents, former presidents, presidential candidates and their families, as well as current and former secretaries of state, have been compromised by Iranian intelligence assets,’ according to ‘three knowledgeable sources.’
It is likely that Routh is a mentally unstable individual who took it upon himself to carry out crazy plots that could help Ukraine or Taiwan, and then set out to assassinate Trump. His apparent connections to a hostile foreign power, however, warrant close scrutiny in the days ahead. It is worth recalling that after the failed assassination attempt on Trump’s life in July, sources claimed that “U.S. authorities” were aware of an Iranian plot to kill the Republican candidate.
It is not impossible that Iran saw Routh, who publicly and privately sought to connect with foreign governments, as an easy vessel for its plan. That seems unlikely and could be entirely false. But it is a question that lawmakers will surely raise in the days ahead: Was the U.S. government aware that a convicted felon was flying to Ukraine and Taiwan, apparently in contact with people in Iran (according to the Times), and posting assassination fantasies on Amazon? Has he managed to establish serious connections with foreign governments?
Shawn VanDiver, founder of the AfghanEvac coalition, posted on X to point out that Routh was known but dismissed as crazy.When this guy’s stupid plan came to fruition [AfghanEvac] Our response was strong. My advice was to stay away from him. That we were not going to ask the Afghans to go fight this war. They have already done enough and have earned their place in our country,’ VanDiver wrote.
I asked Alex Plitsas, a veteran of the Afghan evacuation and Ukraine who had come across Routh’s tweets in the past, what he thought of the alleged Trump assassin. “There are people who come up with crazy, unrealistic ideas because they have no experience, but they’re trying to be helpful,” Plitsas told me. “Other times, some of them have mental health issues. This gentleman was a known entity online, and everyone kept a distance. He didn’t seem dangerous and he wasn’t unique.”
Plitsas described Routh’s plan as ‘a cross between The Bourne Identity in his mind and The Emperor’s New Clothes in reality, where he is the only one who does not realize that what he was proposing was completely crazy and unrealizable’.
