Why the Story of the Golf Course Shooting Will Be Told Twice

Florida’s governor says a state investigation is needed because federal agencies can’t be trusted.

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Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, right, listens as Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody speaks during a news conference on Tuesday.

Usually, after a deadly emergency or an event that could have become one, the governor of the state where it happened somberly pledges to support the agency investigating it however he or she can.

This is not quite what happened in Florida after the apparent attempted assassination of Donald Trump on one of his golf courses over the weekend.

Instead, after the F.B.I. announced it was investigating the incident, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, a Republican, announced that his state would do its own research on what had happened.

“In my judgment, it’s not in the best interest of our state or our nation to have the same federal agencies that are seeking to prosecute Donald Trump leading this investigation,” DeSantis said on Tuesday morning at a news conference in West Palm Beach, raising the possibility that the suspect, Ryan Routh, could face a state charge of attempted murder.

It is not uncommon for state and federal investigators to conduct parallel inquiries after a major event — but it is uncommon for state leaders to publicly impugn federal investigators in the process. It’s a sign of the way Sunday’s incident has become the latest front in the war that Trump’s party is waging with federal law enforcement, and the latest example of Republicans seeking to release their own version of the facts to score political points.

So today, I reached out to my colleague Patricia Mazzei, the Miami bureau chief for The New York Times, to ask about the apparent assassination attempt and DeSantis’s investigation. Our conversation was edited and condensed.

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