Secret Service to blame for Trump assassination attempt: officials – NBC10 Philadelphia

What you need to knowMembers of a bipartisan House task force investigating Trump's assassination attempts stressed in their first hearing that the Secret Service, not local authorities, was responsible for the failures planning and communications that led a gunman to open fire on former President Donald. Trump in Pennsylvania. Lawmakers repeatedly questioned why the agency charged with protecting the nation's top leaders did not do a better job of communicating with local officials during the July 13 rally, particularly when it came to to secure the building that Thomas Michael Crooks was able to scale and open fire on Trump. The panel of seven Republicans and six Democrats has spent the past two months analyzing security lapses at the rally, conducting nearly two dozen interviews with law enforcement and receiving more than 2,800 pages of documents from the secret services.

Members of a bipartisan House task force investigating Trump's assassination attempts emphasized at their first hearing Thursday that the Secret Service, not local authorities, was responsible for the planning and communications failures that led a gunman to open fire on former President Donald. Trump in Pennsylvania.

Lawmakers repeatedly questioned why the agency charged with protecting the nation's top leaders did not do a better job of communicating with local officials during the July 13 rally, particularly when it came to to secure the building, which was widely recognized as a security threat but ultimately was left so unprotected that gunman Thomas Michael Crooks was able to climb in and open fire on Trump.

In the days leading up to the rally, no mistake allowed Crooks to foil the plans of one of our nation's most elite groups of security professionals. There have been security failures on several fronts, said the committee's Republican co-chair, Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania.

It's also clear, however, that communication between the Secret Service and local and state partners was disjointed and unclear, said Rep. Jason Crow, the panel's ranking Democrat, who also praised the forces of local order.

Trump was injured and a man attending the rally with his family was killed.

The panel of seven Republicans and six Democrats has spent the past two months analyzing security lapses at the rally, conducting nearly two dozen interviews with law enforcement and receiving more than 2,800 pages of secret service documents.

Lawmakers are also investigating a second assassination attempt against Trump earlier this month, in which a man armed with a rifle attempted to kill the Republican presidential candidate while he was playing golf at one of his golf courses in South Florida.

But Thursday's hearing focused largely on the rally shooting with testimony from Pennsylvania and Butler County law enforcement officials.

The Secret Service often relies on local authorities to organize larger events at which protégés like Trump appear across the country. But after Butler's rally, the agency was heavily criticized for not clearly communicating what it needed from local agencies that day.

One of the key questions has been why there were no law enforcement personnel at the top of the AGR building, where Crooks eventually climbed and fired, given that he was so close to the rally stage and provided a clear line of sight to Trump.

“A 10-year-old looking at that satellite image could have seen that the biggest threat posed to the president that day was the building near the scene,” said Republican Rep. Pat Fallon of Texas.

Edward Lenz, commander of the Butler County Emergency Services Unit in charge of local tactical units operating at the Butler rally, said his agency was never asked to station a sniper team on the roof and never said she would. Lenz said the Secret Service knew their shooters were inside the AGR building and there was no feedback or indication from the Secret Service that they wanted the team anywhere else.

They knew where we would be, Lenz said. “They knew what our plan was.

Lenz also said that Secret Service officials did not check with him or his team to ensure they were in place before Trump took the stage and that the July 13 emergency communication did not had not been worked out in advance.

Drew Blasko, deputy team leader of the sniper unit with the Butler Township Emergency Services Unit, said he raised concerns about the building with the Secret Service before the rally and said his team didn't have the manpower to station anyone there. He said he asked the Secret Service for additional people to be assigned and was told “they would take care of it.”

Some witnesses also said there were discussions in advance about using opaque screens or large agricultural equipment to block the line of sight to the scene, but it is unclear exactly what happened. to these suggestions.

Lawmakers struggled during questioning Thursday to get witnesses to focus on a single individual or moment that led to the assassination attempt. Local police officials and a retired Secret Service agent also testified, outlining a series of incidents and errors that ultimately allowed Crooks to remain undeterred for an extended period of time and ultimately shoot the former president.

Communication was totally lacking here,” said Rep. Correa, a Democrat from California. “What went wrong? Who is responsible?

Thursday's session was the fourth congressional hearing on the Butler shooting since July. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned a day after appearing before Congress in which she was berated for hours by Democrats and Republicans over the agency's security failures.

Cheatle called the attempted assassination of Trump in Pennsylvania the most significant Secret Service operational failure in decades, but she angered lawmakers by failing to answer specific questions about the investigation.

An interim report released Wednesday by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which is also investigating, said the Secret Service failed to provide clear instructions on how state authorities and local authorities should cover the building where the shooter finally took up position. The report also said the agency did not ensure it could share information with local partners in real time.

The Secret Service also released a five-page document summarizing the main findings of a yet-to-be-finalized agency report on what went wrong at Butler. Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe said the agency was ultimately responsible for what happened, and at a news conference last week to announce the findings of that report, he cited complacency among agency staff and said they need to do a better job of communicating. with local and state authorities.

The House panel is expected to propose a series of legislative reforms and release its own final report by Dec. 13.

Although the oversight investigations have been bipartisan, Democrats and Republicans disagree on whether to give the Secret Service more money in the wake of its failures. A government funding bill passed Wednesday provides an additional $231 million for the agency, although many Republicans were skeptical and said an internal overhaul of the Secret Service was needed.

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