Days After Rally Scare, Masked Man With AK-47 Arrested Near Trump’s Party Event

Just days after a failed assassination bid against former US President Donald Trump, an armed man wearing a ski mask was arrested in the area where the Republican National Convention is being held, reports said.

The man was carrying a concealed AK-47 pistol in his tactical backpack, the Fox News reported. Officials also found a full magazine of ammunition inside the bag.

Prominent Republican politicians and officials are gathered at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee for the Republican convention this week.

“United States Capitol Police initially observed the suspect looking suspicious, wearing a ski mask and a large tactical backpack in the street,” the CNN reported quoting Milwaukee Police Department.

In a separate incident, a man – who was wielding two knives near the convention – was shot dead by the cops. According to the police, the man, identified by relatives as 43-year-old Samuel Sharpe, was armed with a knife in each hand. The situation escalated when Sharpe charged at an unarmed individual, prompting the officers to open fire. Two knives were recovered from the scene.

This comes days after a 20-year-old man was gunned down for trying to assassinate the 78-year-old former president at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania.

Trump survived with a nicked ear during his rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday after Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire at him. The attack left him with a bloodied face as the former president said the bullet pierced his “upper part of right ear”.

Donald Trump won formal nomination Monday as the Republican presidential candidate and picked 39-year-old Ohio Senator J.D. Vance as his running mate.

While Trump is increasingly confident of a shock return to the White House — despite multiple legal problems and two impeachments during his first term — President Joe Biden is reeling from weak polls and Democratic concerns over his health.