Does a video show Thomas Matthew Crooks, identified by authorities as the man who shot at former President Donald Trump, shouting, "slash Republican throats"? No, that's not true: An Arizona State University official told Lead Stories that the FBI, in an unrelated 2020 investigation, identified the man filmed shouting threats on the Tempe campus and that he was not Thomas Crooks. University president Michael Crow said the shouter shown in the video has a different name and different date of birth than the suspect in the attempted assassination of former President Trump.
The claim originated in a post and video (archived here) where it was published on X, formerly known as Twitter, on July 14, 2024. It opened:
Thomas Matthew Crooks
"Slash Republican throats"
This is what the post looked like at the time of writing:
(Source: X screenshot taken on Mon Jul 14 17:21:33 2024 UTC)
The shooter who attempted to assassinate Trump was identified (archived here) on July 13, 2024 by the FBI as 20-year old Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. He was shot and killed, according to the U.S. Secret Service (archived here) -- by officers.
The person in the video is not Crooks. The footage was posted on the Students for Trump at ASU X account (archived here) on February 5, 2020, showing a man appearing in all black yelling, saying "slash Republican throats," and screaming expletives.
The incident was reported in the Arizona Republic newspaper in 2020, in two articles about the situation, here (archived here) and here (archived here) and took place on February 5, 2020. A man approached a group of Students for Trump on the ASU Tempe campus and yelled, "slash his throat," and "slash fascist throats" as well as "slash Republican throats." The newspaper reported the police at Arizona State University stated they were investigating the situation:
"We are aware of a video circulating on social media where an individual appears to be making threats. We are working with the University to address the matter," the department posted at 8:33 p.m.
Lead Stories contacted the office of Arizona State University President Michael Crow, and the office responded via email on July 15, 2024, with a statement from Crow (archived here):
ASU concluded its investigation back in 2020, in conjunction with the FBI, and determined the subject in the video was not a credible threat - and that person has a different name and different date of birth than the suspect in the attempted assassination of former President Trump over the weekend.
Crow also decried the false claim gaining traction in social media posts offering no evidence:
As social media promulgates the usual kind of unsubstantiated and ill-informed theories about the shooting of former President Trump, one post being circulated attempts to implicate Arizona State University. In response to all this nonsense, I would like to caution everyone once again about believing the garbage you read on social media. To be clear, the individual who attempted to assassinate former President Trump had no association with ASU and was not the person seen on a video on the ASU campus four years ago.
More fact checks by Lead Stories about the assassination attempt on Donald J. Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024 can be found here, here, here and here.
