Chilling new emails reveal that Thomas Matthew Crooks, the gunman who tried to assassinate President Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania rally, was also working on building a bomb. Crooks, 20, shot dead one person, wounded two others, and grazed the then-Republican presidential candidate's ear during the attack in Butler on July 13, 2024.
The ongoing FBI investigation into Crooks—whom senior officials have confirmed was not tied to any foreign conspiracy—has shed further light on the would-be assassin's plans and preparations. At the time of his failed attempt to assassinate Trump, Crooks was in the process of applying for a four-year engineering program while enrolled at a community college.
Dangerous Plans of a Would-Be Assassin
Meanwhile, he used an encrypted email account to purchase more than two gallons of nitromethane from a company called Hyperfuels. Twelve days after placing the order, Crooks sent a follow-up message asking about the delay.
"Hello, my name is Thomas. I placed an order on your website on January 19.
"I have not received any updates of the order shipping out yet and I was wondering if you still have it and when I can expect it to come," he wrote on January 31 at 7.44am.
Federal investigators were able to access the email because it was sent from an account tied to the Community College of Allegheny County, where he was a student.
Much attention has been given to Crooks' political views, especially since he was reportedly a registered Republican who had also made a donation to Joe Biden.
The emails reveal a young man highly critical of the federal government, including one essay, where he blamed NASA for the 1986 Challenger explosion, and in another, he praised a George Orwell piece warning against imperialism.
Trump is mentioned only once in the documents in an essay that supports nuclear energy and criticizes Trump's decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal during his first term.
Crooks also briefly mentioned Biden while analyzing a 2021 Washington Post op-ed that opposed the then-president's proposal to offer free community college tuition.
Bigger Massacre Avoided
Wally Zimolong, who obtained the records on behalf of America First Legal, an organization led by Trump adviser Stephen Miller, said, "A year later, we still don't know enough" about Crooks. "I think it raises a lot of important questions. Were they investigating anyone else? Are they still investigating?" Zimolong asked.
Of the hundreds of emails reviewed from Crooks' college account, few provide insight into the shooting itself, but they do offer a glimpse into his everyday life. In one message, he wrote to a professor asking if it would be acceptable to bring only two or three adults to a presentation that originally required him to bring five.
"I do not have access to any other adults" besides his parents and his sister, he wrote.
Overall, Crooks is portrayed as an A-level student who expressed his fondness for the fall season and stayed in regular contact with his professors. "It's sad that he had so much promise and he chose to do this. It's just very difficult to understand where it came from," Patricia Thompson, one of his professors, said.
On the day of the rally, Crooks positioned himself on a nearby rooftop just a few hundred feet from where Trump was speaking, armed with an AR-15 rifle and hid in a crouched stance.
From a distance of less than 150 yards, he managed to fire eight shots in Trump's direction, one of which struck the former president in the right ear.
