Updated February 4, 2026 at 12:48 PM EST
Ryan Routh, the man charged with trying to assassinate Donald Trump when he was running for president in 2024, will spend the rest of his life in prison. In a hearing Wednesday in Fort Pierce, Fla., U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon gave Routh a life sentence.
Routh, 60, was found guilty on five counts for his planned attempt on Trump's life when the then-presidential candidate was golfing at his club in West Palm Beach.
Routh's planned attack came just two months after Trump survived another assassination attempt in Pennsylvania. In that incident, Thomas Crooks fired several shots from a semi-automatic rifle, wounding Trump on his right ear. Crooks was shot and killed at the scene by a Secret Service agent.
In September 2024, a Secret Service agent saw a man he later identified as Routh holding a semi-automatic rifle hidden in the tree line at Trump International in West Palm Beach. The agent accosted and then fired on Routh, who fled in his car and was arrested a short time later.
In a 2 1/2-week-long trial last fall, prosecutors spent seven days detailing Routh's activities in the weeks before the planned sniper attack. They said Routh, a former roofing contractor, traveled from North Carolina to West Palm Beach. Using cellphone data and license plate readers, investigators tracked his movements as he scouted locations while living in his vehicle at a truck stop.
Routh's defense case, by contrast, took just a few hours. In the months before the trial, he had a series of disagreements with his federal public defenders, and Judge Cannon allowed him to represent himself in court. Routh presented just three witnesses and a disjointed, ineffective defense. He told the jury that he was a peaceful and nonviolent person who lacked the "cold heart" needed to kill someone. It took the jury two hours to find him guilty on all charges.
In court, when the verdict was read, Routh attempted to stab himself in the neck with a pen before being subdued by federal marshals. Afterward, in a series of erratic court filings, Routh apologized to the judge for what he called "the nuisance of the trial." Referring to his attempt to stab himself when the verdict was read, he wrote, "just a quarter inch further back and we all would not have to deal with all this mess."
Prosecutors want the judge to impose a life sentence. At Routh's request, Judge Cannon appointed a new attorney to represent him at sentencing. In a court filing, Routh's lawyer cited his client's ineffectual defense, his mental health and his age and asked for a reduced sentence of 27 years.
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