An internal Secret Service investigation has found multiple catastrophic security incidents leading up to the attempted assassination of Donald Trump.
Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, fired eight rounds into a crowd in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, hitting Trump in the ear and killing three people at a rally.
In a new report, officials say the entire operation to protect the former president was “alarmingly sloppy” and that the communications system had “significant weaknesses.”
Much has already been revealed about the random communications between local police, but the investigation revealed that the Secret Service did not have access to real-time updates from local police.
When authorities in the area were contacted about a suspicious man who had shown up at the meeting, it was not heard on Secret Service Radio, which is used by the service in lieu of the military-backed systems used to protect the president and vice president.
An internal investigation by the Secret Service confirms that multiple catastrophic security incidents occurred prior to the attempted assassination of Donald Trump
Officials in a new report have called the entire operation to protect the former president “alarmingly sloppy” and the communications system had “significant weaknesses” that led to the president being shot.
The snipers who eventually took out Crooks were initially ordered to send photos via text message to only one Secret Service official, meaning no general bulletin could be sent.
This lax behavior came despite the fact that police had seen Crooks carrying a rangefinder and said he was behaving strangely.
No one from the Secret Service could have heard at the time about authorities’ attempt to find Crooks after he was spotted as Trump began his speech and never secured the roof of the AGR building he used to fire the shots, senior administration officials told the Washington Post.
The investigation is said to have gone beyond the shooting, as it emerged that the Secret Service delayed security for Trump during the campaign despite an Iranian plot to assassinate American political candidates.
US leaders, such as Senator Richard Blumenthal, who serves on the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, have said they expect a shocking revelation from the investigation’s findings.
“I think the American people will be shocked, appalled and dismayed by what we are going to report to them about the failures of the Secret Service in the attempted assassination of the former president,” he said Thursday.
Directors within the organization have already started rolling after disgraced director Kim Cheadle resigned following the shooting.
The Secret Service confirmed that Office of Protective Operations Assistant Director Mike Plati resigned ahead of the report’s release on Friday, while Chief John Buckley and a senior, unnamed Pittsburgh agent are retiring.
Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, fired eight bullets into the crowd, hitting Trump in the ear and killing three people at the rally, one of them fatally, on July 13 in Butler, Pennsylvania during a rally
In August, a whistleblower alleged that the top Secret Service agent in charge of Donald Trump’s deadly rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, was “inexperienced” and “failed to implement proper security protocols.”
Last week, a shocking Congressional report emerged stating that Trump’s would-be assassin Thomas Crooks was taken out by a local police officer before being killed by a Secret Service sniper.
Two months after Crooks shot the former president’s ear out at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, a preliminary report by Rep. Clay Higgins offered a different story than the official narrative pushed by the FBI.
Although it was initially claimed that Crooks had been shot in the head within seconds by a Secret Service sniper, Higgins claimed in his report that it was actually a local SWAT agent who stopped the shooter’s hail of bullets.
The congressman said the local officer’s shot “hit Crooks’ rifle and struck his face/neck/right shoulder area due to the butt of the rifle breaking,” meaning Crooks could not continue firing before he was killed.
The announcement comes as the FBI and Secret Service face increasing scrutiny over the investigation into the shooting, just weeks after Higgins revealed that Crooks’ body had been mysteriously cremated with FBI permission after just 10 days.
A bullet hit the former president in the ear, while two others were seriously injured and former firefighter Corey Comperatore was tragically killed while heroically defending his family from the incoming fire.
Trump recovered from his injuries and resumed his campaign, appearing at the Republican Party Convention two days later.
