"He definitely was conservative": Classmates paint picture of Republican "outcast" who shot Trump

Donald Trump was shot in the ear Saturday by a 20-year-old registered Republican described by most former classmates as a loner who was bullied in high school, with at least two describing him as a conservative.

The FBI has identified the deceased shooter as Thomas Matthew Crooks of Bethel Park, a suburb of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Crooks, who graduated high school in 2022, used his father’s legally purchased “AR-style 556” semiautomatic rifle, per the bureau, to open fire on the former president as he spoke at a campaign rally, wounding the presumptive Republican nominee, killing another man, and injuring two other attendees who had come to hear him speak. Crooks was shot dead by a member of the Secret Service.

Crooks’ former classmates at Bethel Park High School described him as quiet, nerdy kid who, according to some, was abused by his peers.

“I mean, he was just an outcast,” Jason Koehler told NBC News, saying Crooks was “bullied so much in high school” for the way he dressed: usually in hunting gear.

Others disputed that Crooks was bullied but shared the assessment of him as an outsider.

“I will say he was definitely nerdy, for sure, but he never gave off that he was creepy or like a school shooter,” Mark Sigafoos told CBS News.

“He just seemed like a normal boy who was not particularly popular but never got picked on or anything,” Jameson Myers told the outlet, who noted that Crooks tried out for his high school rifle team in freshman year but was rejected “because of how bad of a shot he was — it was considered, like, dangerous.”

Crooks would go on to join an area shooting range, the Clairton Sportsmen’s Club, the BBC reported. On Saturday, he was found wearing a t-shirt for the YouTube channel “Demolition Ranch,” which features videos on guns and explosives. Law enforcement authorities told CBS that an explosive device was later found in Crooks’ vehicle.

While some Trump allies have sought to blame Democratic rhetoric for the shooting, no classmate has described him as ever speaking negatively about the former president.. Myers, who said he had known the shooter since elementary school, said Crooks “never acted, like, by any means, a political revolutionary.”

Campaign finance records show that in January 2021, as a 17-year-old, Crooks gave $15 to the Progressive Turnout Project, a pro-Democrat political action committee, Axios reported. However, records show that he later registered as a Republican and voted in the 2022 midterm elections. This November would have been the first presidential contest for which he would have been old enough to participate.

Crooks was certainly not a liberal, according to at least two former classmates.

“I would almost put money on the fact that I probably had seen him wear a Trump shirt or something along the lines of that beforehand, which is why this is so shocking to me,” Paige Updegraff told Pittsburgh public radio station WESA.

Max R. Smith, another classmate who took a history course with the shooter, told The Philadelphia Inquirer that Crooks would talk about politics but never said anything that would suggest he hated Trump.

“He definitely was conservative,” Smith said. “It makes me wonder why he would carry out an assassination attempt on the conservative candidate.”

Smith noted that, in class, the teacher would often ask students to take a side on a political issue being debated. Crooks always sided with the right.

“The majority of the class were on the liberal side, but Tom, no matter what, always stood his ground on the conservative side,” he said. “That’s still the picture I have of him. Just standing alone on one side while the rest of the class was on the other.”