An affidavit in the criminal complaint against alleged Trump assassin Ryan Wesley Routh indicates he had an SKS rifle with him, according to reports.
CNN pointed to FBI Special Agent Mark A. Thomas’s affidavit, indicating the gun found in the bushes where Routh had allegedly been was a “loaded SKS-style 7.62×39 caliber rifle with a scope.”
In a press conference shortly after Routh’s arrest, Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw described the gun as an “an AK-47 style rifle with a scope.”
An AK-style rifle and an SKS-style rifle bear some resemblance to one another, in that both are Soviet-era guns and both firearms run off 7.62×39 ammunition. However, whereas AK-47s can be had in automatic or semiautomatic versions — the former used on battlefields and the latter available for the civilian market — SKS rifles are strictly semiautomatic.
In addition to Soviet manufacturers, SKS rifles were also made by the Chinese.
The 7.62×39 round faded from popularity in America for a time, as numerous other rifle rounds emerged, but the round has made a resurgence among hog and predator hunters.
NBC News noted the federal complaint against Routh says the serial number of the SKS rifle he allegedly possessed “was obliterated and unreadable to the naked eye.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a member of Gun Owners of America, a Pulsar Night Vision pro-staffer, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly: awrhawkins@breitbart.com.