MOSCOW (Reuters) – The Kremlin said on Monday that the Ukrainian links of the alleged shooter in the assassination attempt on former U.S. President Donald Trump showed that “playing with fire” had consequences.
Asked about what the FBI called an apparent assassination attempt on Trump, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said:
“It is not us who should be thinking, it is the U.S. intelligence services who should be thinking. In any case, playing with fire has its consequences.”
The comment was a clear reference to the United States’ support of Ukraine against Russia.
CNN, Fox News and the New York Times identified the suspect as Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, of Hawaii, citing unidentified law enforcement officials.
Three social media accounts bearing Routh’s name suggest he was an avid supporter of Ukraine in its war against Russia.
The New York Times reported it had interviewed Routh in 2023 for an article about Americans who were volunteering to help the Ukraine war effort.
Routh told the Times he’d travelled to Ukraine and spent several months there in 2022 and was trying to recruit Afghan soldiers who fled the Taliban to fight in Ukraine.
(Reporting by Dmitry Antonov; writing Felix Light; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)
