HONOLULU — Alleged would-be Trump assassin Ryan Wesley Routh may have targeted the former president over his admiration of Russian President Vladimir Putin, a former coworker told The Post.
Routh, 58, was arrested Sunday hours after he aimed an AK-style rifle at Trump from a makeshift sniper’s nest in the shrubbery that lines the real estate mogul’s golf course in West Palm Beach, Fla.
“He was against the war in Ukraine … but that’s what I put together, that he never liked him because he was with [Russian President Vladimir Putin],” Routh’s former coworker, John Tamura, told The Post Thursday of the assassination attempt, the second move on Trump’s life in just under three months.
“I figured that’s probably why he disliked him.”
Tamura, 59, worked with Routh building houses in Hawaii up until about four months ago, he explained.
“He mentioned about politics, but I’m not into that so I wouldn’t get into it,” he said.
“He just said he never liked [Trump] because he was with the Russian president…He never said nothing about killing anyone or anything like that.”
Trump’s supposed relationship with Putin has been a source of speculation and criticism for years.
In a radio interview in 2022, Trump boasted that he knew the Russian autocrat “very, very well” and called him “a very savvy” guy.
Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Trump claimed that the war never would have started if he had been re-elected president in 2020.
“Under our administration, Russia respected America, just like every other country respected America, but now Joe Biden is seen as weak,” Trump said at the time.
“As everyone understands, this horrific disaster would never have happened if our election was not rigged and if I was the president.”
Democrats have frequently accused Trump of relying on Russian help to win the presidency in 2016, despite the fact that an investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller turned up no evidence of unlawful collaboration between the Kremlin and the Republican’s campaign – and a follow-up probe by special counsel John Durham found that the initial FBI investigation of the collusion claims was “seriously flawed.”
Routh, meanwhile, had an obsession with the Ukraine war and even self-published a book about the conflict last year in which he encouraged Iran to kill Trump.
He visited Kyiv in 2022, and periodically reached out to the International Legion of Ukraine with “nonsensical ideas” that “can best be described as delusional,” said Oleksandr Shahuri of the Foreigners Coordination Department of the Ukrainian Ground Forces Command.
Routh talked about his strong feelings on the Ukraine conflict at work, Tamura told The Post.
“He was against the war. He mentioned he was going to go up there to help out with the war. I told Ryan, ‘You crazy. Who would do that? Volunteer to go up there and risk your life.’ When he did that, I thought he was serious about trying to make the world a better place,” he recalled.
“He went so far to buy a bulletproof vest and all.”
Routh came off as a “real opinionated king of guy…but he wasn’t a violent person,” Tamura added.
The only gun Tamura knew that Routh had was a pellet gun to shoot roosters that crowed outside his house, he said.
Tamura said he gave Secret Service the same explanation about Routh when the federal agency knocked on his door on Monday.
Tamura worked with Routh until about four or five months ago, when Routh said he was going to visit his sick mom in North Carolina, he said.
“He didn’t mention that he’d go up there and do that to Trump,” the shocked former coworker insisted.
“I don’t know what he was thinking.”
Routh is now facing federal gun charges for the foiled assassination plot. He smirked in his new mugshot released Thursday by the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.
