As the FBI works to uncover a motive behind the attempted assassination of former President Trump at a campaign rally, agency officials said Sunday they believe the shooter, who wounded two other people and left one dead, acted alone.
Shots rang out at the event in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday night, sparking panic among attendees. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee said the shooting pierced the top of his right ear.
“At this moment, it is more important than ever that we stand together and show our true character as Americans, by staying strong and determined, and not allowing evil to win,” Trump wrote on his social media site.
The FBI has identified the shooter as Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. At a briefing Sunday, officials said they have not yet identified “an ideology associated” with Crooks.
Kevin Rojek, FBI special agent in charge in Pittsburgh, said the weapon used was a 556 AR-style rifle, which law enforcement officials believe was purchased legally by Crooks' father. Authorities said it's unclear how the teen gained access to the gun.
During a search of the shooter’s car, Rojek said, officers found “a suspicious device,” which was inspected by explosives experts and made safe. Authorities said they are investigating the shooting as an attempted murder and are also considering it as a “possible act of domestic terrorism.”
Rojek said there is no indication yet that the shooter had mental health issues.
Pennsylvania State Police identified the man who was fatally shot as Corey Comperatore, 50, of Sarver, Pennsylvania. They identified the other two victims as David Dutch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74, who are in stable condition.
At a news conference Sunday, Gov. Josh Shapiro said Comperatore’s wife asked Shapiro to share that her husband “dedicated himself to protecting his family.” The governor called the attempted murder “absolutely unacceptable and tragic.”
“My message to all Pennsylvanians, my message to all Americans, is to stand firm in your beliefs, to believe what you believe, to stand up for what you believe in, and to participate in the political and civic process, but to always do so peacefully, to remember that whether we are Democrats or Republicans, we are, first and foremost, Americans,” Shapiro said.
President Biden, speaking from the Roosevelt Room of the White House on Sunday afternoon, reiterated his call for the most stringent security measures to be taken for Trump. The president said he will ask the Secret Service to review security measures for the upcoming Republican National Convention.
“An assassination attempt is contrary to everything we stand for as a nation,” Biden said. “It is not who we are as a nation, it is not America, and we cannot allow this to happen. Unity is the most elusive goal of all, but nothing is [more] “The most important thing right now is unity.”
President Biden speaks from the Roosevelt Room of the White House on Sunday about the attempted assassination of former President Trump at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania. Vice President Kamala Harris and Attorney General Merrick Garland listen.
(Susan Walsh/Associated Press)
We must, Biden said, “come together as one nation.”
About a quarter-mile from the 100-acre Butler Farm Show Grounds where the rally took place, dozens of Trump 2024 signs dotted the lawns of Whitestown Road, a quiet residential street lined with dozens of homes.
Robert Runyan, 34, who lives in Whitestown near the rally site with his fiancée and their four children, was sitting five to 10 rows from the podium when the shots rang out. People sitting in the center and right rows immediately threw themselves to the ground, but Runyan initially thought the noises were fireworks.
Jessica Lynch and her fiancé Robert Runyan. Runyan was near the front of former President Trump's rally when shots rang out Saturday in Butler, Pennsylvania.
(Noah Goldberg/Los Angeles Times)
Then, he said, he heard more gunshots in quick succession. He saw that there were elderly people, a man with an oxygen tank and a woman in a wheelchair nearby. He tried to protect them as best he could, and after the gunshots stopped, he told The Times, he began helping them up.
He noticed Trump standing up and heard the crowd starting to cheer, but Runyan said he wasn't celebrating with the others. He was more focused on a man in the stands who had been wounded by gunfire. Three people nearby were trying to help him. One woman let out a “bloodcurdling” scream, which Runyan said would “stick with her forever.”
“In a few seconds, you understood that [Trump’s] “It’s fine, but then you realize the magnitude of what’s going on,” he said. “You’re looking at the Secret Service and you’re looking at the reactions of everyone around you.”
Runyan’s fiancée, Jessica Lynch, 34, did not attend the rally because she said she had a “weird feeling” that something might happen. When she dropped her 15-year-old son off at the fairgrounds around 11 a.m., she said she told him to duck or run if he heard gunshots.
“There are too many Trump detractors,” he told the Times. “And I had a bad feeling that they were going to shoot up the place.”
Former President Trump is surrounded by U.S. Secret Service agents at Saturday's campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
(Evan Vucci/Associated Press)
Lynch was at home painting when she saw the news of the shooting on TV. She received a text from Runyan saying Trump had been shot. Then her phone went silent. Lynch began to panic and cry in her driveway before getting in her car and heading to the rally. She was relieved to see Runyan, unharmed, in his bright yellow shirt.
“You can’t go anymore,” he told Runyan. “There are a lot of dynamics you have to think about. You’re fine physically, but what if our son ends up leaving early because he’s so hot? What if our 10-year-old goes with him? What if there’s gunfire into the crowd?”
Runyan is dealing with the trauma of what she witnessed.
Although he was not an ardent Trump supporter like his 10-year-old son, Runyan said he voted for him in the 2016 election because he did not want to support the Clintons. This time around, he said he does not plan to vote for either Biden or Trump. He said he has always been a “stand your ground” type of person and hopes a balance can be found between the left and right.
Runyan believes the moment Trump stood up and raised his fist in the air could change the course of the election for some voters.
“It was a very powerful moment for people who knew what was going on,” he said. “If they ever had any doubts, they no longer have any.”
Joseph Meyn, 51, waited for hours at the rally for Trump to speak around 6 p.m. Meyn said he alternated between watching a nearby Jumbotron, which contained a bar graph of illegal immigration rates over the past few years, and Trump speaking at the podium.
At one point, he told The Times, he heard seven shots in rapid succession, all within a little more than a second. Meyn, who owns an AR-15, said he is familiar with guns and knows what high-powered weapons sound like.
“I immediately see contrails heading toward the podium,” he said.
Meyn said that when he turned to face the podium, he noticed that a man had been shot in the back of the head and “immediately died.” When Meyn looked at Trump, who he said had turned his head to the left, “that’s when I noticed that the bullet had severed the top of his ear.”
“It was chaos,” she said. “People were screaming and crying. Everyone around me threw themselves to the ground.”
Meyn, a doctor, rushed to help, heading to the bleachers to his left, jumping over a steel barrier and meeting State Police officers and a doctor.
“I went up to him and said, 'I'm a surgeon. I can help.'”
“That man is dead,” said the doctor of the person who was shot in the head.
Meyn said the man's family appeared to be in the stands with him. One woman in her 20s or 30s asked if her loved one was going to be OK.
“Someone said, ‘No, he’s dead.’ Immediately, she burst into hysterical tears, she couldn’t breathe. You could physically see her soul being crushed like an empty aluminum can,” Meyn said. “I will go to the grave with that etched in my mind.”
If Trump had not turned his back, Meyn said, “he would be dead. He would have been assassinated.”
Meyn said he has always liked Trump and described him as a “person who can take a more pragmatic approach to issues,” but added that “in this incredibly polarized political climate,” he was surprised this hadn’t happened sooner.
“People who are involved in our political process in this country, at the end of every election cycle… they all walk away from the zero-sum political game as if it’s the end of the world; you either won everything or you lost everything,” Meyn said.
“Our country as a society is very sick and it is not getting better,” he said. “We have to make major changes in our society and in our discourse, or this will only get worse.”
Matthew Ammann II, 26, drove an hour from Niles, Ohio, to attend the rally with his cousin, his cousin’s girlfriend and their friends. Ammann wore a black Trump 2024 T-shirt, red shorts and a Make America Great Again hat.
Ammann said he witnessed the moment Trump raised his fist.
“My favorite part, to be honest, was when, after he got shot, he raised his fist and told everyone, ‘This isn’t over. This is just the beginning,’” Ammann said.
“It changed my whole perspective on Trump,” he said. “If I could afford it, I would travel to every Trump rally in the country and fist bump the whole way.”
Goldberg and Lin reported from Butler, Pennsylvania. Mejia and Orellana Hernandez reported from Los Angeles.
