U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon sentenced Ryan Routh to life in prison for attempting to assassinate President Trump during the 2024 presidential election cycle, according to AP News.
Federal prosecutors said Routh spent months planning the attack, showed willingness to kill anyone who interfered, and expressed zero remorse during the trial. They asked the judge to impose a life sentence on Routh to “send a message that seeking to assassinate a Presidential candidate will result in the most severe punishment.”
Prosecutors said that Routh “plotted painstakingly to kill President Trump, and took significant steps toward making that happen, culminating on September 15, 2024 at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, when he sat in a sniper hide that he had carefully constructed, chambered a round in the military-grade SKS rifle that he possessed illegally, and pointed it toward President Trump and his protective detail.”
Routh’s assassination plot of the president was only thwarted, prosecutors said, “by a Secret Service agent who noticed and disrupted Routh before Routh could fire a shot.”
Judge Cannon previously rejected Routh’s motion for her recusal when he was charged in the fall of 2024.
“Mr. Trump is the current Republican candidate for President in next month’s election,” Routh’s lawyers wrote to Cannon in October 2024.
“On the campaign trail, he has repeatedly praised Your Honor for her rulings in his case. As the alleged victim here, he has a significant stake in the outcome of this case too. Were he to become President in the future, he would have authority to nominate Your Honor to a federal judgeship on a higher court were a vacancy to arise,” they wrote.
Routh, who represented himself during the trial, was assigned a court-appointed attorney ahead of the sentencing hearing.
During closing arguments, Routh told the court in a rambling statement that no crime occurred because he never fired a shot.
After two hours of deliberation, the jury found him guilty on all five counts, including federal gun charges and assaulting a Secret Service agent.
A psychiatric evaluation concluded Routh was competent enough to stand trial.