by Dan McCaleb
U.S. Secret Service agents shot at and later arrested a man with an AK-47 rifle near Donald Trump’s West Palm Beach, Fla., golf club Sunday afternoon while Trump was on the course. The FBI said it is investigating the incident as an attempted assassination of the former president, the second in two months.
Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said at a news conference that the Secret Service alerted local authorities that shots were fired about 1:30 p.m. Sunday. A Secret Service agent who was monitoring the course a hole ahead of Trump noticed a man with a rifle pointing the barrel through a chain-link fence near shrubbery that surrounds the course, Bradshaw said. The agent fired on the alleged gunman, who was approximately 300 to 500 yards away from the former president. Trump, the Republican nominee for president, was rushed back to the clubhouse in a golf cart and was unharmed.
A witness told authorities he saw the gunman running from the scene to a car, and was able to get the car’s license plate, Bradshaw said. Agents were able to track the vehicle and arrested the suspect, Bradshaw said. He remains in custody. No other details were released about the suspect.
“Fortunately, we were able to locate a witness that came to us and said, ‘Hey, I saw the guy running out of the bushes. He jumped into a black Nissan, and I took a picture of the vehicle and the tank,’ which was great,” the sheriff said. “So we had that information … put it out to the license plate readers, and we were able to get a hit on that vehicle on I-95 as it was headed into Martin County. We got a hold of Martin County Sheriff’s Office, alerted them, and they spotted the vehicle and pulled it over and detained the guy.”
Authorities found the rifle, a scope, two backpacks and a GoPro camera in the bushes where the gunman was hiding.
“The FBI has assumed the role as the lead federal law enforcement agency in the investigation of the incident that occurred earlier today at Trump International Golf course here in West Palm Beach, Florida,” Jeffrey Veltri, special agent in charge of the FBI Miami field office, said at the news conference. “We’ve deployed a number of resources, including investigative teams, crisis response team members, bomb technicians and evidence response team members as well.”
Trump told Fox News that he was on the 5th hole when he heard gunshots.
“Tell everybody I am fine and the Secret Service did a great job,” Trump told Fox News.
The West Palm Beach golf club is less than five miles from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home.
Bradshaw said that if Trump were a sitting president, there would have been more security around the perimeter of the golf course.
Sunday’s incident occurred two months after Trump was the target of an assassination attempt at a campaign rally in Butler, Pa. Trump was grazed by a bullet in his ear in the Pennsylvania shooting just two days before the start of the Republican National Convention. The suspect in the earlier assassination attempt was shot ad killed at the scene.
The Secret Service was widely criticized for its lax security efforts after the Pennsylvania attempt. Kimberly Cheatle, the director of the U.S. Secret Service, resigned under heavy pressure.
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Dan McCaleb is the executive editor at The Center Square.
