Trump rally shooter Thomas Crooks, seen in a yearbook photo, first showed an interest in committing acts of public violence in 2019, the FBI say.
Trump rally shooter Thomas Crooks, seen in a yearbook photo, first showed an interest in committing acts of public violence in 2019, the FBI say.
The man who tried to kill former US president Donald Trump in July first showed an interest in committing acts of public violence in 2019 but narrowed his focus to Trump after the announcement of his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, according to an FBI analysis of his electronics.
Investigators -who performed an exhaustive search of the assailant’s devices and online accounts - do not believe Thomas Crooks, the would-be assassin who was killed by a Secret Service sniper, was motivated by a specific political ideology. They have found no evidence he had any co-conspirators or connections to a foreign plot, FBI officials said during a call with reporters on Wednesday.
Soon after, the bureau for the first time released evidence photographs, including the shooter’s gun - a matte black Panther Arms AR-15-type semi-automatic rifle with a removable stock - the oversized black backpack found next to his body and an improvised explosive device found in the trunk of his car.
Thomas Crooks’ rifle broken down, likely done for ease of transport, and the backpack recovered on-site after Crooks tried to shoot Donald Trump. Photo / FBI
While Crooks’ motive remains opaque, his online searches reveal someone who was looking for an opportunity to pull off a spectacular attack that would garner widespread attention, either by inflicting mass casualties or killing someone famous. Thus far, that profile more closely resembles that of a mass shooter than a politically motivated assassin.
Starting when he was a teenager in 2019 through to this year, Crooks progressed from searching “detonating cord”, “blasting cap” and “how to make a bomb from fertiliser” to seeking detailed information about the activities and whereabouts of politicians in the Democratic and Republican parties. By late 2023, his search history included queries related to Trump, US President Joe Biden and both parties’ conventions, the officials said.
“We saw through our analysis of his online searches a sustained, detailed effort to plan an attack on some events, meaning he looked at any number of events or targets,” said Kevin P. Rojek, the special agent in charge of the bureau’s Pittsburgh field office.
Two improvised explosive devices as initially discovered in Thomas Crooks’ car trunk. Photo / Allegheny County, PA Police Department.
When “the Trump rally was announced, early in July, he became hyper-focused on that specific event and looked at it as a target of opportunity”, Rojek added.
Crooks began searching in April for schedule information for Trump and Biden. But after the Butler rally was announced, he began to seek specific information on the placement of the podium, wind conditions and the layout of a warehouse near the site of the rally owned by AGR International. He also used an online ballistics calculator to help him plan his shot, investigators said.
An analysis of Crooks’ search history, and several encrypted email accounts, has revealed no “definitive ideology”, Rojek added, “either left-leaning or right-leaning - it’s really been a mixture”.
The scene after Donald Trump’s rally had been cleared out after the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13. Photo / Doug Mills / The New York Times
On July 13, Crooks, an intelligent but socially isolated 20-year-old from Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, was able to climb on to the roof of the one-storey AGR warehouse, which was just outside the perimeter of the rally at the Butler Farm Show property. He fired eight rounds before he was killed by a single shot fired by a Secret Service sniper. One of Crooks’ shots grazed Trump’s ear; one audience member was killed, and several others were injured.
While most of the attention has moved to the string of failures and lapses that allowed Crooks to get off a deadly volley so close to the stage, many questions remain about him. He worked as a kitchen aide at a local nursing home, had access to his father’s legally obtained collection of firearms and appears to have been concerned about the state of his own mental health.
The gaps in the narrative have been filled, in some cases, by conjecture and conspiracy theories - including the possibility of a second shooter.
“There was no second shooter,” Rojek said. Of the 10 gunshots fired that day, eight came from Crooks’ semi-automatic rifle, one from the Secret Service sniper who killed him and one, fired by a local law enforcement official, did not strike anyone, he added.
Donald Trump, the current Republican presidential nominee, accused the president and vice-president of denying him sufficient Secret Service protection, echoing remarks he made on social media in July. Photo / Roger Kisby / The New York Times
Robert R. Wells, assistant director of the FBI’s counter-terrorism division, said the bureau was taking the unusual step of providing updates on the investigation to push back against a tide of misinformation being promoted on social media.
Representative Clay Higgins, who serves on a congressional task force investigating the assassination attempt, claimed this month the FBI had “cleaned up biological evidence” from the rooftop where Crooks had been killed and released his body to his family too quickly, which he said amounted to obstruction of justice.
FBI officials said Crooks’ body had been turned over only after it had been thoroughly examined by Butler County, state and federal authorities. A toxicology report showed no traces of alcohol or illicit drugs, they said.
