The security gap appears to stem from how and what the agency communicated with local law enforcement before and during the event, and the apparent decision not to place security personnel on the building the gunman climbed up and shot from.
The gunman — Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pa. — was killed by Secret Service agents, but not before he fired multiple shots toward the stage from a rooftop just outside the rally venue, about 152 yards from the GOP presidential nominee. The shooter grazed Trump’s ear with a bullet, killed one attendee and injured two others.
Members of the Secret Service’s counter sniper team and counter assault team were at the rally and placed on rooftops immediately in the vicinity of the stage. But Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle told ABC News that no agent had been placed on the building the shooter climbed because it had a “sloped roof.”
And on Wednesday, it was revealed local police informed the Secret Service ahead of the rally that they didn’t have the manpower to station a patrol car outside the building the gunman later climbed.
Officials are now trying to determine how Crooks was able to climb the building with no intervention by authorities, why law enforcement was not placed on the roof to begin with and whether the event was properly staffed for security.
According to reports, there was a proposal during advance planning to station a patrol car and officer outside the building complex, which had a large roof about 150 yards away from where Trump was standing.
Local law enforcement agencies tasked with securing areas around the venue that included the building, meanwhile, have said a lack of manpower and “extremely poor planning” were to blame for the gap in security.
Also on Wednesday, a call between Senators and Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, Deputy Director Ronald Rowe Jr., FBI Director Christopher Wray and FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate, revealed:
- The Secret Service had flagged Crooks as suspicious more than an hour before he shot from the rooftop.
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They were also told the shooter visited the rally site for 20 or 30 minutes on July 7 to scout out the location and visited it again the morning of the rally.
Multiple federal investigations into the shooting have since been launched and several congressional committees plan to hold hearings.
The inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security — the government arm under which the Secret Service falls — announced Wednesday its own investigation of the agency’s actions before and during the attempted assassination.
Read the full report at TheHill.com.
