Alleged Trump Assassination Plot: Man Accused of Intent to Kill Former President Uncovered with Plans and Note - Justice Department Reveals Details

The man accused in the apparent assassination attempt of Donald Trump at a golf course in Florida left behind a note saying that he intended to kill the former president and kept in his car a handwritten list of dates and venues where Trump was to appear, the Justice Department said Monday.

The new allegations were included in a detention memo filed ahead of a hearing Monday at which the Justice Department was expected to argue that 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh should remain locked up as the case moves forward.

The details are meant to buttress prosecutors’ assertions that Routh is a threat to public safety with a premeditated plan to kill Trump — a plot officials say was thwarted by a Secret Service agent who spotted a rifle poking out of shrubbery on the West Palm Beach golf course where Trump was playing.

The note was placed in a box dropped off months earlier at the home of an unidentified person who did not open it until after last Sunday’s arrest. The box also contained ammunition, a metal pipe, building materials, tools, phones and various letters. The person who received the box and contacted law enforcement was not identified in the Justice Department’s detention memo.

One note, addressed “Dear World,” appears to have been premised on the idea that the assassination attempt would be unsuccessful.

“This was an assassination attempt on Donald Trump but I failed you. I tried my best and gave it all the gumption I could muster. It is up to you now to finish the job; and I will offer $150,000 to whomever can complete the job,” the note said, according to prosecutors.

An attorney for Routh didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment Monday morning.

Cellphone records cited by the Justice Department indicate Routh traveled to West Palm Beach from Greensboro in mid-August, and that he was near Trump’s golf club and the former president’s Mar-a-Lago residence “on multiple days and times” between August 18 and the day of the apparent attempted assassination.

He was arrested on Sunday afternoon after a Secret Service agent who was scoping the Trump International Golf Club for potential security threats saw a partially obscured man’s face, and the barrel of a semiautomatic rifle, aimed directly at him. The agent fired at Routh, who sped away before being stopped by officials in a neighboring county.

The Secret Service has said Routh did not fire any shots and never had Trump in his line of sight.