Thomas Crooks was pacing near a warehouse outside the Butler Farm Show grounds as a crowd assembled for one of former president Donald Trump's signature outdoor rallies. Crooks had already been identified as suspicious by law enforcement. By the time two police officers approached to investigate, he was on the roof, crawling on his stomach. “He’s got a gun,” a bystander shouted. One officer lifted another to the edge of the roof. As the officer peered over, a long-haired young man wearing glasses turned towards him, brandishing an AR-15-style rifle. The officer quickly retreated to the ground, according to the Butler County sheriff's account to Reuters. Crooks, a 20-year-old introverted computer expert who had recently secured a place in a college engineering program, redirected his attention to his target about 400 feet away. He fired several shots at Trump, grazing the former president’s ear, killing an audience member, and injuring two others before Secret Service snipers on a nearby building shot him in retaliation.
This account of the first assassination attempt to harm a U.S. president since 1981 is derived from interviews with over two dozen individuals, including law enforcement officials, Crooks’ school associates, and witnesses at the rally, along with public records and news reports. Crooks fired his rifle at around 6:10 pm, as noted by a Reuters photographer at the event. Trump reacted by wincing and clutching his right ear. Secret Service agents quickly tackled the former president, and some supporters sought cover. A bullet struck what seemed to be the hydraulic line of a forklift holding a bank of speakers to the right of the stage, causing fluid to spray across the crowd and the lift's arm to collapse. To the left, screams arose where a spectator had been fatally shot.
As Secret Service agents tackled the former president, some supporters hurried for safety. Others grabbed children and rushed towards the exits. “The audience wasn't what you'd expect from a crowd that just experienced something like this,” remarked Saurabh Sharma, a Trump supporter seated near the front. “Everyone was very quiet. There were a few women crying. They were, you know, saying, ‘I can't believe they tried to kill him’.” Four days after the assassination attempt, a clearer picture of the moments leading up to the shooting was emerging. However, Crooks’ motives and reasons for the attack remained unclear.
A review of Crooks’ phone by the Federal Bureau of Investigation revealed he had searched for images of both President Joe Biden and Trump, among other prominent figures, in the days prior to the shooting, according to the New York Times, citing U.S. lawmakers briefed on the law enforcement investigation. Crooks had also been looking up dates for Trump’s public appearances and the Democratic National Convention, the report stated. Additionally, he had searched for information on “major depressive disorder” on his phone, the Times reported. Reuters could not independently confirm this report. The shooting occurs amidst a rising trend of political violence and threats in the U.S. According to a Reuters analysis published last year, when such violence turns fatal, it is more likely to be carried out by individuals on the American right. However, the ideological motivation behind Saturday’s attack is still unclear.
Crooks appeared to have a promising future, according to two people who knew him at the Community College of Allegheny County, where he graduated in May with a two-year associate’s degree in engineering. One college instructor, who chose to remain anonymous, told Reuters she had reviewed his assignments, puzzled by how the diligent student who consistently went “above and beyond” could have become violent. The instructor noted his thoughtful homework responses and polite emails. He excelled in an assignment to redesign a toy for people with disabilities, creating a 3D-printed chess set for the blind, complete with Braille. Crooks made less of an impression on classmates. Samuel Strotman, also enrolled in CCAC’s engineering program, took two online classes with Crooks. Strotman said Crooks never spoke in lectures and kept his camera off.
A college employee who knew Crooks described him as quiet but pleasant. “It's just very, very, very unexpected,” the employee said, noting that Crooks had seemed interested in pursuing a career in mechanical engineering. The college closed its engineering program on June 30. Crooks was planning to continue his engineering education at nearby Robert Morris University, the school confirmed. Most recently, he worked as a dietary aide at a nursing home, where he “performed his job without concern,” according to the center. The job was near his home in Bethel Park, a middle-class suburb of Pittsburgh, where he lived in a modest brick home with his parents and older sister.
At Bethel Park High School, where he graduated in 2022, he maintained a low profile, according to classmates. One former classmate told The Philadelphia Inquirer that Crooks expressed conservative views in a history class where other students leaned liberal. Others said his views were never apparent. His photo was missing from his senior yearbook, with his name listed under “not pictured.” He enjoyed gaming and building computers, a classmate told Reuters. Crooks’ town, Bethel Park, is divided almost down America’s political middle. In the 2020 election, Trump narrowly won a 65-vote margin in the borough of about 33,000 people, according to election results.
The political split was evident in the Crooks household. Thomas was a registered Republican. His father is a Libertarian and his mother is a Democrat, according to voter registration records. Both are social workers. When Crooks was 17, he made a $15 donation to a political action committee aimed at increasing Democratic turnout, according to federal election data. His school counselor Jim Knapp, who retired in 2022, said Crooks rarely came to his attention because he wasn’t a “needy type kid.” Knapp occasionally checked on him at lunch because he was often alone. “I’d say, ‘Do you want to sit with somebody?’ And he’d say, ‘No, I’m okay by myself,’” Knapp recalled. Former high-school classmate Max Rich said Crooks was shy and “never seemed like the type” to commit such violence. He left virtually no digital footprint. He spent time on Discord, a gaming platform, but the company said it found “no evidence that it was used to plan this incident, promote violence, or discuss his political views.”
Crooks was a member of the local Clairton Sportsmen's Club, a gun club. He was wearing a shirt advertising “Demolition Ranch,” a YouTube channel for firearms enthusiasts, when he was killed. After the shooting, Matt Carriker, a Texas veterinarian who runs the Demolition Ranch channel, posted a video on X saying he was “shocked and confused” to learn that Crooks was wearing his channel’s merchandise. “We keep politics out of it,” he said, adding that he did not know and had never met or communicated with Crooks. Crooks appeared to spend some time preparing for the Trump event. He bought ammunition on the day of the rally, stopping at a gun store in his hometown of Bethel Park to pick up 50 rounds, according to a joint bulletin issued this week by the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which is leading the investigation.
He built three homemade bombs – two found in his car and another in his home, according to the bulletin, which was reviewed by Reuters. In the preceding months, the bulletin noted, Crooks had received “multiple packages, including some marked as possibly containing hazardous material.” At the rally, Crooks drew the attention of local law enforcement while pacing around the grounds before Trump took the stage. One officer called in a report of a suspicious person and took a photo that was distributed electronically to other officers at the scene, according to Butler County Sheriff Michael Slupe, a Trump supporter who was seated near the front of the rally as a special guest. As two Butler Township Police officers responded to the call, people in the crowd had already noticed a man on the roof. Some yelled that he had a gun, according to crowd-shot video reviewed by Reuters. Slupe told Reuters the officer who initially pulled himself onto the roof had no time to unholster his gun when Crooks turned on him, leaving him no option but to drop back to the ground.
Secret Service officials have stated that their agency is responsible for securing the area within the event’s security perimeter; the building used by Crooks was just outside it. However, some former agency officials and other security experts have disputed this, arguing that buildings with a direct sight line and within firing range of the former president should have been swept and under constant surveillance by the service’s sniper teams. Local officials have taken issue with any suggestions that town or county law enforcement was responsible for securing the building. “The Butler Township Police Department had no security detail for this event,” Butler Township commissioner Edward Natali wrote in a Tuesday post on Facebook, noting that the township had seven officers on site solely for traffic duty. Even though the officer who confronted Crooks on the roof had to fall back, he added, the encounter “most likely forced the shooter to hurry his shots.”
