A congressional task force heard testimony Thursday from local law enforcement officers about how the Secret Service failed to secure a July 13 rally where former President Donald Trump was nearly assassinated.
At the start of the first hearing of the Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump, Chairman Mike Kelly, R-Pa., said shooter Thomas Crooks had an unacceptable opportunity to endanger the lives of the Republican presidential nominee and rally attendees in Butler, Pa.
“I believe this all could have been prevented,” Kelly said. “In hours leading up to the assassination attempt, Crooks had a prolonged and unimpeded ability to stalk the target and identify the most advantageous shooting position, even as Crooks was flagged for suspicious behavior.”
That shooting, along with an apparent subsequent plot on Trump’s life on Sept. 15 near Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, have sparked debate about how the agency can secure the safety of candidates in the 2024 election.
The 12-week stopgap spending measure approved by Congress this week includes a $231 million boost in funds for the Secret Service to address immediate needs. The increase is contingent upon the agency meeting lawmakers’ demands for information as it conducts oversight of the agency.
Rep. Jason Crow of Colorado, the top Democrat on the task force, said in his opening remarks that the agency at its current staffing for agents “is stretched too thin.”
“The Secret Service must be expected to accomplish its zero-fail protection issue without any errors,” Crow said. “But Congress must also ensure that the Secret Service has the resources it needs to accomplish that mission.”
Crooks climbed onto the roof of the American Glass Research (AGR) building less than 200 yards away from where Trump was speaking and fired eight rounds from an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle, killing one person and injuring three others including the former president, a Senate probe found.
The local and state law enforcement witnesses appearing before the House task force Thursday said there were communication gaps with the Secret Service and that the agency took no action after a suspicious person was identified.
Drew Blasko, a patrolman with the Butler Township Police Department, said he raised concerns to the Secret Service about making sure the AGR building was secure, and the response he received was “they would take care of it.”
Asked to clarify whether he thought that meant Secret Service would place the building in the secure perimeter, Blasko responded in the affirmative.
Patrick Sullivan, a former Secret Service agent who is a security consultant in the private sector, said current practices among federal agencies are insufficient.
Sullivan said “there is no statutory requirement” for federal, state and local agencies to report threats against the president or other protected persons to the Secret Service.
“The FBI has exclusive jurisdiction to investigate a conspiracy to assault or kill the president before the attack takes place,” Sullivan said. “Since the Secret Service is responsible for protecting the president, they should be part of all such investigations so they can take appropriate steps to prevent an assassination.”
Sullivan said the lead site agent “is personally responsible for signing off on the entire event package.” Under later questioning, he said any agent at the event could have signaled to others it would not be appropriate to allow Trump to take the stage at the rally.
Rep. Mark E. Green, R-Tenn., drew attention to testimony that local law enforcement, not Secret Service, was responsible for taking the first shot at Crooks after the shooting started, although that shot appeared to miss.
“I just found it interesting that when we were briefed by the FBI, we didn’t get told about that shot taken by the local guys,” Green said.
Ariel Goldschmidt, a medical examiner at Allegheny County, Pa., confirmed only one shot entered the shooter’s body. Under later questioning from Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La., on whether two shots would have caused the one entry wound, Goldschmidt said there is “no evidence” for that.
Higgins, however, was unconvinced: “That’s different from not possible.”
Rep. Chrissy Houlahan, D-Pa., compared the communications gaps between Secret Service and local law enforcement to similar gaps that led to the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
“This was almost exactly what I remember being the problem in terms of responding to Sept. 11,” Houlahan said. “There were all kinds of really well-intentioned, very well-trained people but none of them could hear one another or communicate with one another. It feels as though we haven’t made a whole lot of progress on that.”
One crack in the bipartisan nature of the task force emerged during the hearing.
Democrats didn’t take part in the second part of the hearing with an additional panel of witnesses, indicating during a subsequent press availability they felt surprised by the inclusion of the witnesses and weren’t given opportunity for input. The additional panel wasn’t included as part of the initial announced witness list.
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