Thomas Matthew Crooks, the punk who tried to assassinate former President Donald Trump, evidently thought he was going to be a star.
Federal law enforcement authorities confirmed to Congress during a briefing Wednesday that Crooks had penned an ominous message on an online gaming platform days before the assassination attempt.
“July 13 will be my premiere, watch as it unfolds,” Crooks wrote on the gaming platform Steam, according to Fox News.
NEWS: Fox has learned that Senators were told in the all-member briefing today that Thomas Crooks wrote on a gaming platform called ‘Steam’, “July 13 will be my premiere, watch as it unfolds”
When investigators reviewed the laptop, they found a few searches in July of: Trump,…
— Jacqui Heinrich (@JacquiHeinrich) July 18, 2024
The authorities discovered this message while reportedly investigating Crooks’ laptop. On the laptop they also found online searches for terms such as Trump, Biden, “when is the DNC convention,” and the July 13th Trump rally where the assassination attempt took place.
“The investigators found no evidence of a particular ideology on the laptop, which the FBI believes is notable, and nobody in interviews reported Crooks discussing politics,” Fox News noted.
So from the initial sounds of it, it was a non-ideological nutjob who’d possibly sought fame.
According to reports, the ominous message he wrote was posted on a Steam community forum centered on the game “Mr. President!”
In the game, the player plays as the bodyguard of the fictional “most hated presidential candidate of all time, Ronald Rump.”
Supposedly, Thomas Crooks was playing this on Steam and posted “July 13 will be my premiere, watch as it unfolds’
Under the Mr.President! Game on Steam. https://t.co/Y4DxHTH7fn
— Jessico Bowman (@JessicoBowman) July 18, 2024
Critics are now calling for the game to be banned from Steam because of its equally ominous assassination theme.
Look:
How can a game like this exist
— Jared Vastine (@jared_vastine) July 16, 2024
This game needs to be removed immediately!
— Christi Johnston (@ChristiJoh48218) July 18, 2024
Why is there a game on Steam that simulates a*sassinating the President???
— Craig Chamberlin (@CraigChamberlin) July 16, 2024
Meanwhile, according to a separate report, Crooks’ parents alerted the authorities to him sometime before the assassination attempt last Saturday.
“The Trump rally shooter Thomas Crooks’ parents were looking for him in the hours leading up to the shooting,” Fox News’ Harris Faulkner revealed Wednesday. “We’re now being told they eventually called law enforcement to report that Crooks was missing and they were worried. And we’re also told that the parents are now being cooperative now with authorities. But they gave them the head’s up that something’s going on with our son, we’re worried.”
“We don’t know the texture or the details of their concern. So in other words, were they worried that he had a gun? What were they worried about him? Were they worried that he was going to try to attempt to kill a sitting president and then go ahead and turn into an assassin and kill another person and injure two others? What were they giving the cops the head’s up about?” she added.
Listen:
(Video Credit: Fox News)
A final report from ABC News reveals that Crooks was spotted by the Secret Service as much as 20 minutes before he fired his shot at Trump.
“Officials said the snipers spotted the suspect, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, on the roof of a building outside the security zone at the rally Saturday in Butler, Pennsylvania, at 5:52 p.m. ET.,” ABC News notes. “The shooting happened at 6:12 p.m. ET, 20 minutes later.”
The precise timeline is as follows:
- At 5:10 pm that evening, Crooks was initially spotted as a person of interest.
- Twenty minutes later at 5:30 pm, Crook was spotted with a rangefinder, a special device used to measure the distance between two objects.
- Another 22 minutes later, the Secret Service spotted Crooks.
- Ten minutes later, former President Trump took the stage.
- And another 10 minutes later, Crooks opened fire.
“From the time Crooks fired his first shot to the gunman being killed was just 26 seconds, according to law enforcement officials. Eleven seconds after the first shot, Secret Service counter snipers acquired their target — and 15 seconds after that, Crooks was shot dead,” according to ABC News.
Law enforcement authorities have also confirmed to Congress that Crooks bought an ammunition box from Walmart two days after the July 13th rally was announced.
Writers and editors can be contacted at [email protected] with feedback, tips, or corrections.
V. Saxena is a staff writer with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University. Saxena also contributes to BizPac Review.
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