An unsettling report has been released, highlighting a series of significant oversights by officials related to an unsuccessful attempt on President Donald Trump’s life, which ended with a bullet grazing his ear.
The Department of Homeland Security published this report on Thursday, July 2, outlining numerous failures to identify, prevent, and interrupt the assassination attempt that took place at the July 13, 2024, rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
The findings indicated that officials missed 102 local radio transmissions that contained crucial information about a man, later identified as would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks, who posed a potential threat to the President before the shooting occurred.
The report notes that at 6.09pm local time, law enforcement contacted the Secret Service and Pennsylvania State Police communications room to provide details about Crooks.
They were reportedly warning officials about ‘a suspicious person on the AGR complex’s roof’.
Rather than gathering more information, the supervisor reportedly failed to recognize the situation as a threat and didn’t recall learning that the suspicious individual was on the roof.
The report states that he delegated the communications regarding the suspicious person to a counter drone operator due to it being a ‘busy time’ on Secret Service radios, with the operator offering assistance due to proximity.
The Secret Service counter drone operator, unfamiliar with the rooftop’s location relative to Trump’s position, attempted to locate it through an internet search rather than consulting local police.
The report detailed, “Instead of asking local law enforcement personnel for the AGR complex’s location, the counter drone operator searched online for it, and was still searching when Crooks fired his first shots,” and two minutes after the warning was issued, Crooks shot at Trump eight times.
“Moreover, Secret Service decision-makers responsible for protecting President Trump while on stage at the Butler event were not made aware of Crooks’ presence at any time,” the report further elaborated.
The report also illustrated how a combination of missed emails and an under-resourced Secret Service may have allowed Crooks to execute his plan without hindrance.
Crooks’ use of a drone to survey the area went unnoticed by the Secret Service due to a technical glitch, and the counter drone operator was labeled as ‘under-trained’, with emails to designate an operator for the event remaining unaddressed.
Additionally, the report concluded that the Secret Service failed to receive three communications from local law enforcement regarding the suspect on the roof being armed with a long gun, leading to a lack of urgency in addressing the threat to Trump’s security detail.
Ultimately, Trump’s ear was grazed, one attendee was killed, and others were injured during the incident.
Crooks was subsequently shot and killed by law enforcement at the rally.