Thomas Matthew Crooks

Thomas Matthew Crooks (September 20, 2003 – July 13, 2024) was an American man who attempted to assassinate then-former U.S. president Donald Trump, who at the time was the presumptive Republican Party nominee for the 2024 presidential election.

Very little information about Crooks was released to the public by the FBI. Public opinion polls from a month after the attempt showed that over half of Americans believed that Crooks did not act alone. The assassination attempt has resulted in conspiracy theories.

Early life and education Thomas Matthew Crooks was born on September 20, 2003, Both of Crooks's parents worked as licensed professional counselors, but appear to have left the profession in 2024. Recollections about him, including information about his life and personality, vary considerably.

Crooks attended Abraham Lincoln Elementary School from 2009 to 2014. One of Crooks's friends who attended this school with him, said he was a "nice boy" who "kept to himself." In 2022, he graduated Bethel Park High School with high honors and won a $500 "star award" from the National Math and Science Initiative. Crooks earned a score of 1530 out of 1600 on the SAT, as well as perfect grades on three Advanced Placement exams. Classmates and school officials characterized him as being quiet; Criminologists have suggested that the bullying and isolation may have contributed to Crooks's decision to try to assassinate Trump.

During his freshman year of high school, Crooks anonymously posted threats online, warning students at Bethel Park High School to not come to school the next day. Here, Crooks had claimed to have placed bombs inside the bathrooms in the school's cafeteria. Many students stayed home the following day. The threats were dismissed by the school's administration, and no legal actions were taken.

Crooks earned an associate degree in engineering science from the Community College of Allegheny County in Pittsburgh, graduating two months before the shooting. He was employed as a dietary aide in a nursing home at the time of the shooting. According to the nursing home, which is less than a mile away from where he lived, he had passed a background check and "performed his job without concern". He had been accepted into both the University of Pittsburgh and Robert Morris University in Moon Township, Pennsylvania, northwest of Pittsburgh, and planned to attend the latter. as well as for information regarding the Republican National Convention and the Democratic National Convention. He also searched the Internet for information on major depressive disorder and the 2021 Oxford High School shooting, with authorities finding an arrest photograph of Oxford shooter Ethan Crumbley on his phone.

On December6, 2023, almost seven months before the shooting, Crooks rapidly cycled through several news websites, including CNN, The New York Times, and Fox News, before visiting the Trump administration’s archives. Then, he visited seven gun websites, including one focused on the AR-15, similar to the rifle he would use in the attack. Later that day, he paid a visit to his local shooting range. Much of his online activity in the months before the shooting is not known, because he frequently used a virtual private network. Crooks also searched for information on power plants and the attempted assassination of Slovak prime minister Robert Fico. He used a number of aliases and encrypted communication accounts to buy firearm supplies and bomb-making material. On July12, 2024, Crooks went to a shooting range where he was a member to practice firing.

Before going to the rally on July13, Crooks purchased 50rounds of ammunition and a ladder. He requested the day off from work because he had "something important to do", telling his co-workers that he would return the next day. On July13, Crooks went to the Trump rally. He climbed onto a building that was being used by police as a staging area. Text messages from a police sniper indicate that the police were already aware of his presence 90 minutes before he opened fire. He was armed with an AR-15–style rifle, which his father had bought legally in 2013 and was then legally transferred to him in 2023. Crooks fired a total of eight shots; one bullet grazed Trump's upper right ear, but he was otherwise unharmed. Three adult male audience members were also hit; one of them, 50-year-old Corey Comperatore, suffered a fatal wound. Crooks was subsequently killed by a member of the Secret Service Counter Sniper Team, who shot him in the head. Bomb-making materials were found inside his vehicle and at his home, and a remote detonator was found on his body. The FBI identified him as the shooter on July14. Crooks's motives remain unknown.

Political activities

Authorities have said that Crooks's political views are unknown, and they have not determined whether his assassination attempt was politically motivated.

On January20, 2021, when Crooks was 17, he donated $15 to the Progressive Turnout Project, a liberal voter turnout group, through the Democratic Party donation platform ActBlue. His donation was made on the same day that President Biden was sworn into office. and he voted only once (in the 2022 midterm elections).

In April 2023, Crooks showed his frustration with American politics in a school essay about ranked-choice voting, where he claimed "divisive and incendiary campaigns are pulling the country apart". In another essay, Crooks criticized how NASA handled the 1986 Challenger disaster. He blamed NASA's administrators for the incident, claiming they were "trying to live up to the lofty promises they made to Congress which they were never going to be able to fulfill". Abbate noted that the findings were preliminary and that the comments were still in the process of being authenticated. Some of these alleged comments indicated that Crooks may have been fascinated with the idea of assassinating political opponents, while frequently quoting former Chinese leader Mao Zedong such as; "The only true political power comes from the barrel of a gun."