A U.S. Senate committee’s report on Secret Service failures around the first Trump assassination attempt reveals that the Secret Service found out about Thomas Crooks’ suspicious behavior almost half an hour before he shot the president and killed another man.
The injuries of Donald Trump and multiple rally attendees and the death of Corey Comperatore could all have been prevented had the Secret Service taken the report of a “suspicious person with a rangefinder around the AGR building approximately 27 minutes before the shooting” seriously, the bipartisan report demonstrates (read it below). The incompetence, whether deliberate or accidental, of the Secret Service cost a life and changed American politics. Now there needs to be major accountability for those responsible for this and other egregious failures at the Pennsylvania rally.
There are numerous noteworthy findings in the Senate Homeland Security Committee report, but I will list below a number that I found particularly disturbing and significant. Keep in mind that the U.S. Secret Service (USSS) told the committee that the “technical problems” some agents experienced with their radios at the rally, contributing to the catastrophe, “are common for USSS.” This is entirely unacceptable. From the report (emphasis is original):
USSS personnel were notified of a suspicious person with a rangefinder around the AGR building approximately 27 minutes before the shooting … [it] was relayed to the USSS Security Room at approximately 5:44 pm and to the USSS Counter Sniper Team Leader at 5:45 pm. Shortly after, USSS personnel, including a Counter Sniper Response agent, engaged in an on-the-ground effort to locate the individual. However, the USSS Lead Advance Agent, Site Agent, and Site Counterpart all told the Committee they did not receive this information and therefore did not know local law enforcement had identified a suspicious person with a rangefinder — and that those local officers later lost track of this individual — until after shots were fired.
USSS was notified about an individual on the AGR roof approximately two minutes before [Thomas M.] Crooks fired from AGR roof. Three minutes before shots were fired, a local law enforcement officer sent out a radio alert that there was an individual on the AGR roof. This information was passed to the USSS Security Room approximately two minutes before Crooks fired. Approximately 22 seconds before Crooks fired, a local officer sent out a radio alert that the individual on the AGR roof was armed, but that was [allegedly] not relayed to key USSS personnel that the Committee spoke with.
The report continues:
Shortly before shots were fired, a USSS counter sniper saw local law enforcement running toward the AGR building with their guns drawn, but he did not alert former President Trump’s protective detail to remove him from the stage. The USSS counter sniper told the Committee … the thought to notify someone to get Trump off the stage ‘“did not cross [his] mind.”
USSS counter snipers — including the one who shot and killed Crooks — were sent to the rally in response to ‘credible intelligence’ of a threat. The July 13 rally was the first time a USSS counter sniper team was assigned to a protectee other than the President, Vice President, or a presidential candidate who had been formally nominated by his or her party… [but of] the USSS personnel interview by the Committee, nearly all … said they were unaware of any credible intelligence of a threat.
There's more:
USSS Advance Agents for the July 13 denied individual responsibility … and could not identify who had final decision authority for the rally… Local law enforcement raised concern about the security coverage of the AGR building… USSS advance personnel identified multiple line-of-sight concerns at the Butler Farm Show grounds, including the AGR building … USSS Advance Agents requested additional resources that would have been helpful, but those assets were denied … at times without explanation …
USSS’ C-UAS system experienced technical problems and was inoperable until 4:33 pm, after Crooks flew his drone near the rally site … [troobleshooting] took several hours. That agent [responsible for overseeing it] had only three months of experience working with that equipment and lacked knowledge about it.
The full report is well over a hundred pages long, so this provides only a short excerpt. It is enough, however, to highlight how horrifically the Secret Service failed to protect Trump and how dangerously irresponsible and negligent the agents were. Local law enforcement seems to have done more to protect the former president than the USSS personnel whose primary duty it is to protect him. Now those responsible must be held accountable.
USSS HSGAC Interim Report by PJ Media on Scribd
Join the conversation as a VIP Member