Merrick Garland didn’t ‘veto’ attempted assassination charges against Ryan Routh

Ryan Wesley Routh, the suspect in the Sept. 15 apparent assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump at a Florida golf course, was charged a day later at a West Palm Beach court with two federal gun crimes.

The charges seem to have left some social media users confused and falsely speculating about Attorney General Merrick Garland’s intentions in the case.

"So, Attorney General Merrick Garland just vetoed charging Ryan Routh with attempted assassination," a man said in a Sept. 18 TikTok video that had nearly 200,000 likes by Sept. 20.

The speaker described what happened at the golf course that day and said, "To not charge him with attempted assassination, that means that Merrick Garland has found some reason to think that Ryan Routh was there for some other reason, wearing body armor and carrying a fully loaded rifle."

Users on X and Instagram shared the same video. A man in another TikTok video made the same accusation about Garland.

TikTok identified this video as part of its efforts to counter inauthentic, misleading or false content. (Read more about PolitiFact’s partnership with TikTok.)

Routh in his first court appearance was charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon and possession and receipt of a firearm with an obliterated serial number. But the TikTok videos ignore that the Justice Department said its federal investigation continues, and that more serious charges may come.

(TikTok screenshot)

The Justice Department didn’t respond to PolitiFact’s request for comment, but Garland spoke about the case in a Sept. 17 speech before the community policing group Concerns of Police Survivors in Washington, D.C.

He said the FBI is "continuing to investigate the apparent assassination attempt" against Trump in coordination with local and state law enforcement partners, and that "we will spare no resource in this investigation."

On Sept. 17, FBI agents went to Routh’s Hawaii home searching for evidence. CNN reported Sept. 19, citing unnamed law enforcement sources, that federal investigators were working to build an attempted assassination case against Routh.

The court set a Sept. 23 bond hearing on Routh’s gun charges and a Sept. 30 arraignment.

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Former presidents George H.W. Bush and Jimmy Carter issued pardons to a son and brother, respectively.

It is common for suspects to initially be charged with lesser crimes as an investigation of more serious ones continues, legal experts say.

MSNBC legal analysts Andrew Weissmann and Mary McCord, both former federal prosecutors, explained why in a Sept. 18 episode of their podcast, "Prosecuting Donald Trump."

Weissman noted that Routh was charged in a criminal complaint, rather than an indictment. An indictment will require a grand jury to vote on whether charges should be brought as felonies.

McCord said initial charges in a case depend on whether it is "arrest-generated" or generated by a prearrest investigation. In an arrest-generated event, such as Routh’s case, "by law, there’s only a short period of time where that person has to be presented in court." A judge would then need to find that there was probable cause for an arrest based on a criminal complaint.

"There hasn’t been time for presenting this case to a grand jury. Yet, obviously the government is not ready for Mr. Routh to go about his merry way," McCord said. 

McCord said the government will "take the most readily chargeable offenses," in this case, the gun charges, to keep a suspect behind bars as an investigation continues.

Weissman said sometimes prosecutors will bring charges to put someone "on ice immediately when there’s clear danger." He recalled another case involving a plane bombing suspect where less serious charges were brought initially as the investigation continued.

He was referring to the case of Colombian hitman Dandeny Muñoz-Mosquera, who was a suspect in the 1989 bombing of an Avianca jet that killed 107 people, including two Americans.

A New York Times article said federal officers arrested Muñoz-Mosquera in 1991 in New York who were told a Medellin assassin was in town. They couldn’t prove he was there to kill someone, but charged him with making false statements to federal officers and carrying false Colombian identification. As he served six years in prison on those charges, he was indicted, and later convicted for the plane bombing.

"You can be sure that the FBI is going through any and all evidence, from witnesses, from documents, and getting all sorts of court orders to get access to emails, to find out everything about" Routh to see whether they can make a case for an attempted assassination charge, Weissman said.

Weissman said the federal investigators are also likely looking for evidence about Routh’s mental state, because they will need to "show what his intent was."

The TikTok video’s claim that Garland vetoed an attempted assassination charge against Routh ignores that Garland said the federal investigation of the incident continues. Prosecutors sometimes bring lesser charges against suspects initially and add charges later.

The claim is False.