WASHINGTON – Wisconsin Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson this week speculated without evidence that the federal government could have been involved in the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump in July. 

Speaking on the Federalist Radio Hour podcast Thursday, Johnson derided the government’s investigation into the July 13 shooting during which Trump was grazed by a bullet as “almost completely opaque.” He said there is a “grotesque level of corruption” in the federal government and referenced Richard Nixon and the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

“When you don’t know the federal government involvement in the JFK assassination, when you really don’t know what happened with Nixon … that might’ve been the second coup,” Johnson said. “The first coup is you take out Kennedy, the second coup you take out Nixon, and then you take out Trump.”

“To what extent has the federal government been involved in these things?” Johnson said. “We’ll probably never know because there’s a reason you call it the deep state. It’s very deep. It’s very pervasive.” 

The comments from the Oshkosh Republican are the latest in a string of fringe theories that the “deep state” was behind the shooting that wounded Trump and killed a rally attendee. There is no evidence the government was involved in the shooting, and the FBI has said the 20-year-old shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, acted alone before he was shot and killed moments after he fired on Trump.

Investigators have said Crooks had searched online for events from both President Joe Biden and Trump and said he saw the Trump rally in Pennsylvania as a “target of opportunity.” Kimberly Cheatle, the Secret Service director who resigned in the aftermath of the shooting, called the security failures that day the agency’s “most significant operational failure” in decades.

Johnson, the ranking member on the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, in the interview did not provide evidence to back up the speculation. He instead suggested the lack of transparency from federal investigators, from whom he said he’s been unable to get information, has raised questions about the incident. 

“If you were to design an investigation that was specifically wanted (sic) to create suspicion and drive conspiracy theories, you’d go about it exactly the way the FBI and Secret Service and Department of Justice are going about this,” Johnson said.

When directly asked in the interview if he believed the assassination attempt was an “inside job,” Johnson again referenced the security failures, including how Crooks was able to get onto a nearby roof, and Johnson’s inability to get information on the incident. “It was such a spectacular failure that you kind of scratch your head and go, ‘how could that possibly happen?'” he said.

Johnson, who was reelected in 2022 to his third term in the Senate, has espoused similar theories in the past. Last year, Johnson said it was “certainly possible” government agencies were involved in the Kennedy assassination in 1963 and in the same interview called the jail death of the sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein “fishy.”

Asked to clarify Johnson’s remarks this week, a spokeswoman for the senator told the Journal Sentinel Johnson was “saying that the federal government has consistently lied to the American people and kept information hidden from them.”

“They give us very little reason to trust them,” the spokeswoman, Kiersten Pels, said. 

Johnson, Pels said, was not ruling out the possibility federal agencies were involved in the July assassination attempt.

Pokrovsk, Sumy and Kyiv, Ukraine
CNN
 — 

Dima never puts out a cigarette until he smokes it right down to the filter, risking burning his fingers to squeeze out one more drag. He spent years on the Ukrainian front lines. He knows the price of a good smoke.

As a battalion commander, Dima was in charge of around 800 men who fought in some of the fiercest, bloodiest battles of the war – most recently near Pokrovsk, the strategic eastern town that is now on the brink of falling to Russia.

But with most of his troops now dead or severely injured, Dima decided he’d had enough. He quit and took another job with the military – in an office in Kyiv.

Standing outside that office, chain smoking and drinking sweet coffee, he told CNN he just couldn’t handle watching his men die anymore.

Two and half years of Russia’s grinding offensive have decimated many Ukrainian units. Reinforcements are few and far between, leaving some soldiers exhausted and demoralized. The situation is particularly dire among infantry units near Pokrovsk and elsewhere on the eastern front line, where Ukraine is struggling to stop Russia’s creeping advances.

CNN spoke to six commanders and officers who are or were until recently fighting or supervising units in the area. All six said desertion and insubordination are becoming a widespread problem, especially among newly recruited soldiers.

Four of the six, including Dima, have asked for their names to be changed or withheld due to the sensitive nature of the topic and because they are not authorized to speak to the media.

“Not all mobilized soldiers are leaving their positions, but the majority are. When new guys come here, they see how difficult it is. They see a lot of enemy drones, artillery and mortars,” one unit commander currently fighting in Pokrovsk told CNN. He also asked to remain anonymous.

“They go to the positions once and if they survive, they never return. They either leave their positions, refuse to go into battle, or try to find a way to leave the army,” he added.

Unlike those who volunteered earlier in the war, many of the new recruits didn’t have a choice in entering the conflict. They were called up after Ukraine’s new mobilization law came into force in the spring and can’t leave legally until after the government introduces demobilization, unless they get special permission to do so.

Yet the discipline problems clearly began way before this. Ukraine went through an extremely difficult patch during last winter and spring. Months of delay in getting US military assistance into the country led to a critical ammunition shortage and a major slump in morale.

Multiple soldiers told CNN at the time that they would often find themselves in a good position, with a clear view of the approaching enemy and no artillery rounds to fire. Some spoke of feeling guilty for not being able to provide adequate cover for their infantry units.

“The days are long, they live in a dugout, on duty around the clock and if they can’t shoot, the Russians have an advantage, they hear them advancing and they know that if they had fired it wouldn’t have happened,” said Andryi Horetskyi, a Ukrainian military officer whose unit is now fighting in Chasiv Yar, another eastern frontline hot spot.

Serhiy Tsehotskiy, an officer with the 59th Separate Motorized Infantry Brigade, told CNN the unit tries to rotate soldiers in and out every three to four days. But drones, which have only increased in number over the course of the war, can make that too dangerous, forcing soldiers to stay put for longer. “The record is 20 days,” he said.

As the battlefield situation deteriorated, an increasing number of troops started to give up. In just the first four months of 2024, prosecutors launched criminal proceedings against almost 19,000 soldiers who either abandoned their posts or deserted, according to the Ukrainian parliament. More than a million Ukrainians serve in the country’s defense and security forces, although this number includes everyone, including people working in offices far away from the front lines.

It’s a staggering and – most likely – incomplete number. Several commanders told CNN that many officers would not report desertion and unauthorized absences, hoping instead to convince troops to return voluntarily, without facing punishment.

This approach became so common that Ukraine changed the law to decriminalize desertion and absence without leave, if committed for the first time.

Horetskyi told CNN that this move made sense. “Threats will only make things worse. A smart commander will delay threats, or even avoid them,” he said.

Pokrovsk has become the epicenter of the fight for Ukraine’s east. Russian forces have been inching towards the city for months, but their advances have sped up in recent weeks as Ukrainian defenses begin to crumble.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has made it clear his goal is to gain control over the entirety of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Luhansk regions and taking over Pokrovsk, an important military and supply hub, would be a major step towards that objective.

It sits on a key road that connects it to other military cities in the area and a railroad that links it with Dnipro. The last major coking coal mine still under Kyiv’s control is also just to the west of the city, supplying coke to make steel – an indispensable wartime resource.

Ukrainian soldiers in the area paint a grim picture of the situation. Kyiv’s forces are clearly outnumbered and outgunned, with some commanders estimating there are 10 Russian soldiers to each Ukrainian.

But they also appear to be struggling with problems of their own making.

An officer from a brigade fighting in Pokrovsk, who asked for their name to be withheld for security reasons, told CNN that poor communication between different units is a major issue there.

There have even been cases of troops not disclosing the full battlefield picture to other units out of fear it would make them look bad, the officer said.

One battalion commander in northern Donetsk said his flank was recently left exposed to Russian attacks after soldiers from neighboring units abandoned their positions without reporting it.

The high number of different units that Kyiv has sent to the eastern front lines has caused communication problems, according to several rank-and-file soldiers who were until recently fighting in Pokrovsk.

One said it was not unheard of to have Ukrainian signal jammers affecting vital coordination and drone launches because units from different brigades didn’t communicate properly.

A group of sappers – or combat engineers – spoke to CNN near the border between Ukraine and Russia’s Kursk region, where they have been recently redeployed from just south of Pokrovsk.

Kyiv launched its surprise incursion into Kursk last month, taking Moscow by surprise and quickly advancing some 30 kilometers (19 miles) into Russian territory.

Ukraine’s leaders, including President Volodymyr Zelensky, said one of the goals of the operation was to prevent further attacks on northern Ukraine, while also showing Kyiv’s Western allies that, with the right support, the Ukrainian military can fight back and eventually win the war.

The operation also gave a major boost to an exhausted nation. Ukraine has been on the backfoot for most of the past year, enduring relentless attacks, blackouts and heartbreaking losses.

But the sappers were not too sure about the strategy. Having just finished a long mission over the border, they were slumped around a table outside a closed restaurant near the frontier, waiting for their car to turn up.

Chain smoking and trying to stay awake, they questioned why they were sent to Kursk when the eastern front line is in disarray.

“It felt weird entering Russia, because in this war we were supposed to defend our soil and our country, and now we’re fighting on the other country’s territory,” one of them said. CNN is not disclosing their identities because they were not authorized to speak to the media and due to the sensitive nature of their words.

All four have been fighting for more than two-and-half years and theirs is a tough job. As sappers, they spend days on the front lines, clearing mine fields, preparing defenses and conducting controlled explosions. They can find themselves under attack, ahead of even the first line of infantry, dragging around some 40 kilograms (88 pounds) of kit and four anti-tank mines, each weighing about 10 kilograms (22 pounds).

Speaking to CNN, they appeared completely exhausted. They had no rest between their Pokrovsk mission and the one in Kursk.

“It depends on each commander. Some units receive rotations and have time off, while others are just fighting non-stop, the whole system is not very fair,” one of the soldiers said. Asked if the advances in Kursk gave them the same boost as the rest of the nation, they remained skeptical.

“After three years of this, war, everything feels the same,” one of the men told CNN.

Speaking to CNN on Thursday, Ukraine’s Commander in Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi admitted low morale is still an issue and said raising it was “a very important part” of his job.

“The Kursk operation… significantly improved the morale of not only the military but the entire Ukrainian population,” he said.

He said he had been going to the front lines regularly to meet with the soldiers there and do what he could to make them feel better. “We understand each other no matter who I am talking to, whether it is an ordinary soldier, a rifleman, for example, or a brigade commander or a battalion commander… I know all the problems that our servicemen, soldiers, and officers experience. The front line is my life,” he said.

And Horetskyi – an officer specially trained to provide moral and psychological support to troops – is part of the plan to boost morale.

During recent leave in Kyiv, Horetskyi told CNN that while his role has existed for a while, it consisted mostly of paperwork. Now he spends a lot more time with his unit, checking in, making sure they are not burning out. Not that his help is always appreciated.

“They have this idea that I’m a shrink that will make them take thousands of tests and then tell them they are sick, so I try to break down the barriers,” he said, adding that little distractions can prevent a downward spiral.

In the monotony of war, any break from the routine can help, he said. This can include a wash in a real shower, a haircut or going for a swim in a lake. “It’s such a little thing, but it gets them out of the routine for half a day, it makes them happy, and they can return to their positions a bit more relaxed,”  Horetskyi explained.

Even officers with many years of experience are finding the situation in the east difficult.

Some, like Dima, are transferring to posts away from the front lines. He said his decision to leave the battlefield was mostly down to disagreements with a new commander.

That, too, is increasingly common, several officers told CNN.

The ranks of Dima’s battalion grew thinner and thinner, until the unit disappeared.

They never received enough reinforcements, Dima says, something he blames squarely on the government and its reluctance to recruit more people.

The battalion suffered painful losses in the past year, fighting on multiple front lines before being sent to Pokrovsk without any rest. Dima saw so many of his men killed and wounded, he became numb.

Yet he told CNN he is determined to go back to the front lines, but will make one change first.

“I’ve now made the decision that I will stop getting attached to people emotionally. It’s a rotten approach, but it’s the most sensible one,” he said.

Former President Trump on Saturday dismissed findings from the Justice Department about Russia’s covert efforts to influence the 2024 U.S. elections and joked about whether he should be offended that Vladimir Putin had offered a tongue-in-cheek endorsement of Vice President Harris.

Trump held a rally in Wisconsin, where he referenced a Justice Department announcement earlier in the week that it seized 32 web domains Russia has used for its influence campaigns.

“Three days ago it started again. The Justice Department said Russia may be involved in our elections again,” Trump said. “Russia. It’s Russia. And you know the whole world laughed at them this time.

“They said just the other day, the attorney general, ‘We are looking at Russia.’ And I said oh no. It’s Russia, Russia, Russia all over again,” Trump said, referring to the investigation into his 2016 campaign by special counsel Robert Mueller. “But they don’t look at China and they don’t look at Iran. I don’t know what it is with poor Russia.”

The Biden administration earlier this week condemned Russian efforts to influence the 2024 U.S. election.

The Justice Department seized web domains and targeted two employees of RT, formerly known as Russia Today, a Russian state media outlet with content available in English, charging the duo with violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The indictment accuses the two of partnering with a conservative-leaning media company to help sow division in the U.S.

Collectively, the two actions are some of the strongest moves taken under the Biden White House to confront accelerating efforts by the Russian government the intelligence community has deemed “the predominant threat to U.S. elections.”

Trump has in the past cast doubt on the intelligence community’s findings that Russia was attempting to influence U.S. elections, including during a meeting he had alongside Putin in 2018.

The intelligence community determined Russia attempted to influence the 2016 election, which Trump won, and the Justice Department investigated the Trump campaign over possible coordination with Moscow. The final special counsel report found no evidence of collusion.

Trump on Saturday also quipped about comments from Putin, who earlier in the week joked that he is supporting Harris in the upcoming election, citing her “infectious” laugh and potential to change U.S. sanctions on Russia.

“He endorsed Kamala. I was very offended by that. I wonder why he endorsed Kamala. No, he’s a chess player,” Trump said.

The former president has repeatedly said Putin does not fear or respect the current administration, though Trump’s critics have accused him of cozying up to autocrats and dictators.

U.S. intelligence officials warned Friday that the Russian government’s covert efforts to sway the presidential election are “more sophisticated than in prior election cycles,” and that Moscow is using artificial intelligence to create increasingly convincing fake content that could aid Trump. Four years ago, the Senate Intelligence Committee unanimously endorsed the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia intervened in the 2016 election in an effort to boost Trump.

But Trump, who has repeatedly described the probes into Russian interference in the 2016 election as a “hoax,” is dismissing them this time around, too.

“The Justice Department said Russia may be involved in our elections again,” Trump told the crowd at his rally. “And, you know, the whole world laughed at them this time.”

The Republican presidential nominee’s comments appeared to reference the indictment Wednesday of two Russia-based employees of Russia’s state-run news site, RT, in an alleged scheme in which they paid an American media company to spread English-language videos on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and X.

“It’s Russia, Russia, Russia all over again. But they don’t look at China and they don’t look at Iran. They look at Russia. I don’t know what it is with poor Russia,” Trump said.

Trump’s rally, at the airport in Mosinee, Wis., was billed as focused on “draining the swamp,” but featured a stump speech that meandered from familiar attack lines about inflation and jobs to falsehoods about sex-change operations for minors, conspiracy theories about government employment statistics and dismissals of Russian interference in American elections.

The indictments were part of the administration’s most sweeping effort yet to tackle what it described as Russian disinformation campaigns ahead of the November election.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told The Washington Post this week that the indictments were “nonsense” and denied Russian interference in the elections. And Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday said that he wants Vice President Kamala Harris to win the election, rather than Trump, in a tongue-in-cheek endorsement that was widely viewed — including by the former president — as an effort to undermine rather than support her.

“I knew Putin, I knew him well,” Trump said at the rally Saturday. “The other day he endorsed Kamala. He endorsed Kamala. I was very, offended by that … I think it was done maybe with a smile.”

Peskov said in an interview on Russian TV this month that Moscow views Harris as a more predictable opponent than Trump. “The Democrats are more predictable. And what Putin said about Biden’s predictability applies to almost all Democrats, including Ms. Harris,” he said.

But Russia, which is in the midst of a bloody, protracted invasion of its neighbor Ukraine, has other interests at stake in the 2024 election.

Trump, who has often boasted about his relationship with Putin and claimed without evidence that Russia would never have invaded Ukraine if he was president, has expressed deep skepticism about continuing U.S. military aid to Ukraine.

“I will have that war finished and done and settled before I get to the White House,” Trump vowed Saturday, repeating sentiments that the Kremlin has previously dismissed. “As president elect, I will get that done.”

Cheeseman reported from Washington. Azi Paybarah contributed to this report.