No easy answer to why Thomas Matthew Crooks tried to kill Trump

When anything momentous happens, particularly an act of violence, there is an immediate desire to know two things: How did this happen, and why?

More videos of the moments leading up to events in Butler, Pennsylvania, have provided fresh details on what’s known about the physical aspects of the shooting. It seems clear that there was a serious lapse of security and confusion about areas of responsibility between the Secret Service and local law enforcement. The AP called it “a devastating failure of one of the agency’s core duties,” as the shooter was only 150 meters away from where Donald Trump was speaking at a rally. President Joe Biden has ordered a full investigation as well as increased security.

But the answer to “who was this guy?” doesn’t seem a lot clearer now than it did in the moments after the shooting. At just 20 years old, Thomas Crooks doesn’t seem to have left behind a long history of political opinions, or even a note. As with so many instances in which young men engage in gun violence, reporters are left looking for the truth about Crooks in a way that is unlikely to produce any satisfactory answers: by talking to his high school classmates.