Ryan Routh, 59, was convicted last year of trying to kill Trump while he was still a presidential candidate, during an incident at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, according to the BBC.
A US Secret Service agent spotted the barrel of a rifle protruding from nearby bushes and fired at Routh, who then fled the scene before being arrested a short distance away.
In a sentencing memorandum, Judge Aileen Cannon said Routh’s crimes “undeniably warrant a life sentence.”
“[H]e took steps over the course of months to assassinate a major presidential candidate, demonstrated the will to kill anybody in the way, and has since expressed neither regret nor remorse to his victims,” Cannon wrote.
Routh’s lawyer, Martin Ross, said the defence would appeal the conviction.
Routh pleaded not guilty and chose to represent himself at trial, which began on 8 September. A native of North Carolina who had been living in Hawaii prior to his arrest, he repeatedly behaved erratically during court proceedings, including challenging Trump to a game of golf and making references to Adolf Hitler and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
After the jury returned a guilty verdict, Routh attempted to stab himself in the neck with a pen before being quickly restrained and escorted from the courtroom by US marshals.
Although investigators said Routh never had a clear line of sight to Trump, federal agents testified that they recovered a semiautomatic rifle with a scope and extended magazine from the area where he had been hiding.
Jurors were also told that Routh left behind a list of locations where Trump was likely to appear, along with a note to a friend describing the incident as “an assassination attempt”.
In his closing statement, Routh spoke in the third person and digressed into unrelated topics, including US history, the war in Ukraine and plans to buy a boat, prompting Judge Cannon to repeatedly interrupt him and dismiss the jury.
Source: BBC