Ukraine says would-be Trump 'assassin' had 'delusional ideas' about supporting country's fight against Russia as it emerges Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, was rejected by Kyiv's forces due to inexperience and age

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has condemned the apparent assassination attempt against Donald Trump, allegedly carried out by a suspect who had travelled to Ukraine to support the war effort.

'It's good that the suspect in the assassination attempt was apprehended quickly. This is our principle: the rule of law is paramount and political violence has no place anywhere in the world,' Zelensky wrote on X, addressing his best wishes to Trump and his family. 

Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, was arrested after US Secret Service agents 'opened fire on a gunman' carrying an AK-47 style rifle near the boundary of Trump's Florida golf course where the former president was playing golf on Sunday. The incident took place exactly two months after a separate assassination attempt against Trump during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

Routh had previously expressed support for Ukraine's fight against the Russian invasion, and had even travelled to the war-torn country in 2022, telling Newsweek Romania in a newly resurfaced interview that the conflict with Russia was a simple case of good versus evil.

But Ukrainian officials have distanced themselves from Routh.

An unnamed high-ranking Ukrainian official told AFP: 'He did not serve here and has no ties to state structures, that's for sure. He entered Ukraine as a nobody, just a supporter, there are many people like this.'

According to The Telegraph, Routh was reportedly rejected from the International Legion for the Defence of Ukraine given his lack of military experience. 

Additionally, The Guardian reported that Ukraine's foreign legion described Routh's ideas surrounding the conflict 'delusional'. 

Speaking about his involvement in Ukraine to Newsweek Romania in 2022, Routh had said: 'The question as far as why I'm here -- to me, a lot of the other conflicts are grey, but this conflict is definitely black and white,' Routh told Newsweek.

'My original goal was to come and fight. All of us, from the entire planet, should be motivated to support the Ukrainian army, but I'm 56 years old and have no military experience, so I'm not an ideal candidate to actually fight.

'So plan B was to come to Kyiv and promote the idea of ​​many others coming to join the International Legion. We need thousands of people here to fight alongside the Ukrainians.'

Routh had also outlined in a video posted online his plan to recruit fighters by moving Afghan soldiers, in some cases illegally from Pakistan and Iran, to Ukraine. 

So dedicated was Routh to Ukraine's war effort he even helped cut the grass at Independence Square in Kyiv using scissors. 

The Kremlin on Monday said that a presumed assassination attempt on Donald Trump was a sign that the US election campaign was 'intensifying'.

'We can see how tense the situation is there, including between political rivals - the political fight is intensifying,' Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. 

'We are watching it closely, but we have never interfered in this in any way and we are not interfering now.'