The United States military has admitted its failure to protect former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on July 13.
Trump, 78, was shot by a young gunman while he was addressing an election rally in Butler. Trump survived the assassination attempt as one of the bullets passed within a millimetre of him and one of them hit his right ear.
“The Secret Service takes full responsibility for the tragic events of July 13. This was a mission failure. Our agency’s sole responsibility is to ensure that our protected people are never put in danger. At Butler, we failed to do that. And I am working to ensure that this failure does not happen again,” US Secret Service Acting Director Ronald Rowe told reporters at a news conference here.
The main role of the Secret Service is to protect the President, former Presidents and their family members. Presidential candidates also receive protection from the Secret Service.
Rowe said the Secret Service would continue to cooperate with the pending oversight investigation into the July 13 failure, which is now being conducted by Congress, the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General and an independent review directed by President Joe Biden.
“I am not waiting for those reports to be completed, and I have directed the Secret Service to take immediate steps to ensure that our security personnel are truly safe. I am committed to holding the Secret Service accountable for its failure in Butler, Pennsylvania.”
“But let me be clear. If the agency’s Mission Assurance Review identifies policy violations by Secret Service personnel, those individuals will be held accountable. They will be held accountable through our fair and thorough disciplinary process,” he said.
Describing the sequence of events on July 13, Rove said Trump arrived at the campaign rally at 5.30 pm via a Secret Service motorcade and at that time he met with supporters in a secure backstage area within the protective venue.
At 5:45 p.m., a local counter sniper team member from the Butler County Emergency Services Unit sent a message to the Secret Service Counter Sniper Team leader about a suspicious person and sent two photographs of the man, later identified as the assailant.
At 5.53 p.m., the Secret Service Counter Sniper Team leader sent a message to Secret Service Counter Sniper Teams that local law enforcement agencies were searching for a suspect hiding in the vicinity of the AGR building.
At this time, Secret Service personnel were working with information that local law enforcement agencies were working on a suspicious person case.
At 6 p.m., former President Trump took the stage to begin his speech.
“Based on what I know right now, neither the Secret Service counter-sniper teams nor members of the former president’s security team were aware that there was a man with a gun on the roof of the AGR building. My understanding is that personnel were not aware that the attacker had a gun until they heard gunfire,” he said.
“At 6:11 p.m., a member of former President Trump’s security team contacted his Pittsburgh field office counterpart to inquire about a radio update that local law enforcement was investigating an issue near the perimeter.
“At 6:11 p.m., the gunman fired three shots, and within three seconds, the former president’s security guards rushed to the stage, surrounded Trump and shielded him with their bodies,” Rowe said, giving a timeline of the failed assassination attempt on July 13.
“The fourth through eighth shots were fired over the next few seconds. Fifteen-and-a-half seconds after the attacker’s first shot, a Secret Service counter sniper fired a shot, killing the attacker,” he said.
Rowe told reporters it was a failure.
He said, “We should have provided better security for the protected individual. We should have provided better coverage on that roof line. We needed some other people to keep an eye on him, at least from a Secret Service perspective. That building was too close to that outer perimeter, and we should have had more of a presence there.”
He said, “It was a failure by the Secret Service. That roof line should have been covered. We should have kept a better eye on it.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
