EXCLUSIVE: Former President Trump said President Biden and Vice President Harris’ “rhetoric” is what is causing him to be “shot at,” following the second assassination attempt against him since July, while telling Fox News Digital that the suspected gunman “acted” on “highly inflammatory language” of Democrats.
Trump spoke exclusively with Fox News Digital Monday morning, just a day after he was rushed off of the golf course at Trump International in West Palm Beach, Fla., after the Secret Service discovered a gunman in the bushes.
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The suspected gunman, Ryan Wesley Routh, had an AK-47 style rifle pointing through the chain-link fence out toward the green; a go-pro camera; and two backpacks. He ran from the scene but was pulled over and arrested on I-95.
Authorities are treating the episode as an apparent assassination attempt against Trump.
The motorcade for President Donald Trump arrives at Trump International Golf Club, Feb. 15, 2020, in West Palm Beach, Fla.
Trump was safe following the second assassination attempt against him since July.
“He believed the rhetoric of Biden and Harris, and he acted on it,” Trump said of the gunman in an interview with Fox News Digital. “Their rhetoric is causing me to be shot at, when I am the one who is going to save the country, and they are the ones that are destroying the country — both from the inside and out.”
Trump pointed to Biden and Harris’ past comments casting Trump as a “threat to democracy,” while telling Americans they are “unity” leaders.
“They are the opposite,” Trump said. “These are people that want to destroy our country.”
He added: “It is called the enemy from within. They are the real threat.”
Ryan Routh is accused of aiming an AK-47 at former President Trump while he was golfing at his course in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sunday. It is being investigated as a second assassination attempt on Trump. (Obtained by Fox News Digital)
A background check on the name given by officials, Ryan Wesley Routh, revealed that he currently lives in Hawaii and has faced dozens of run-ins with police, stretching back to at least the 1990s.
Routh previously echoed Biden and Harris’ anti-Trump comments, that “Democracy is on the ballot” on his social media pages this year, and that Democrats “cannot lose.”
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Routh posted about politics often and donated to only Democrat candidates and causes.
“They do it with a combination of rhetoric and lawsuits they wrap me up in,” Trump said. “These are the things that dangerous fools, like the shooter, listen to — that is the rhetoric they listen to, and the same with the first one.”
Democrats, meanwhile, have repeatedly blamed Trump for raising the temperature and have accused him of being a “threat to democracy,” particularly due to his handling of the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the U.S. Capitol.
The White House, Harris’ campaign, and the office of Minnesota Gov. Time Walz, Harris’ running mate, did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment.
Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference held at Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., on Friday, Sept. 13. (AP/Jae C. Hong)
Trump also said Biden and Harris’ policies are “destroying” the country “by allowing millions of very dangerous migrants to pour into it and destroying our country and cities.”
“On the outside, we are weak and feeble and not respected by the world anymore,” Trump said.
Meanwhile, reflecting back on the debate against Harris last week, Trump slammed the media.
“The media is made up of fools that will spew [Democrats’] garbage and spew their sick philosophies and will protect them at all costs, and they can’t believe they get away with it,” Trump said. “Democrats are totally protected by the media.”
Trump said the debate on ABC News last week “was so biased and so out of control.”
“Harris was the one lying about Project 2025, she lied about abortion, she lied about everything,” Trump said. “She was correcting me.”
“It was three against one,” he said. “I was surprised at David Muir. I thought he was a high-quality person, but he is just a sleeze like the rest of them.”
But with just 50 days until Election Day, Trump warned Democrats to watch their rhetoric.
“They use highly inflammatory language,” he said. “I can use it too — far better than they can — but I don’t.”