Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, and probably a good friend of former US President Donald Trump, dropped an insensitive comment on the social media platform after the Republican candidate faced a second assassination attempt on Sunday. Trump was the target of what the FBI said "appears to be an attempted assassination" at his golf club in West Palm Beach, Florida, on September 15, just nine weeks after the Republican presidential nominee survived another attempt on his life. The former president said he was safe and well, and authorities held a man in custody.
However, the business tycoon, Musk, on X, wondered, "And no one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala". The insensitive post came in response to a query from an X user with the handle @cb_doge, who asked why the former President was being targeted.
Who is Ryan Wesley Routh?
CNN, Fox News and The New York Times identified the suspect as Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, of Hawaii, citing unidentified law enforcement officials. The FBI declined to comment and Reuters could not independently verify his identity. Reuters found profiles on X, Facebook, and LinkedIn for Ryan Routh, and public access to the Facebook and X profiles was removed hours after the shooting. The three accounts bearing Routh's name suggest he was an avid supporter of Ukraine in its war against Russia.
When suspect asked Musk for rocket
On April 21, Routh directed an X message to Elon Musk, in which he wrote: "I would like to buy a rocket from you. I wish to load it with a warhead for Putins Black sea mansion bunker to end him. Can you give me a price please." The New York Times reported it had interviewed Routh in 2023 for an article about Americans who were volunteering to help the Ukraine war effort. Routh told the Times he'd traveled to Ukraine and spent several months there in 2022 and was trying to recruit Afghan soldiers who fled the Taliban to fight in Ukraine.
On X in 2020, Routh expressed support for Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and mocked Biden as "sleepy Joe."
Earlier this year, Routh tagged Biden in a post on X: "@POTUS Your campaign should be called something like KADAF. Keep America democratic and free. Trumps should be MASA ...make Americans slaves again master. DEMOCRACY is on the ballot and we cannot lose." The suspected gunman's son, Adam, reached by Reuters at the hardware store where he works in Hawaii, said he had not yet heard of the newest Trump assassination attempt and had "no information," adding it was not something he believed his father would do.
Later, the reporter called back to the store and a colleague said Adam had gone home because of an emergency. Another son of Routh's, Oran, told CNN in a statement that "I don't have any comment beyond a character profile of him as a loving and caring father ... I don't know what's happened in Florida, and I hope things have just been blown out of proportion."
(With inputs from agencies)
