Most of the security personnel working at the Donald Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, during which the Republican presidential candidate was shot, weren’t even Secret Service, US Senator Josh Hawley has claimed, citing whistleblowers.
Shots fired from the roof of a nearby factory nicked Trump’s ear, killed one audience member, and injured two more before the sniper was taken out by law enforcement.
“Whistleblowers tell me that MOST of Trump’s security detail working the event last Saturday were not even Secret Service,” Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, said on Friday, accusing the Department of Homeland Security of assigning “unprepared and inexperienced personnel” to the campaign rally.
In a public letter to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Hawley said whistleblowers with “direct knowledge of the event” told him that the majority of the security detail “were not in fact USSS agents but instead drawn from the department’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).”
According to the whistleblowers, the security did not use dogs to monitor the area, allowed people without proper badges to access the backstage, did not have people stationed around the perimeter or deployed around the podium, among other things.
Hawley is a member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and notified Mayorkas that he will fully protect these whistleblowers, while continuing to investigate the “staggering security failures on July 13.” He demanded answers on the whistleblowers’ claims from Mayorkas within seven days.
The building from which Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire had been the base for local law enforcement helping with security. It remains a mystery how he managed to get onto the roof undetected by the authorities, and stay there despite civilians repeatedly warning the police and the Secret Service for almost 20 minutes before he fired.
Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle has tried to explain the absence of Secret Service personnel on that particular roof by claiming it was too sloped and posed a safety risk. Unconvinced, the House Oversight Committee has issued a subpoena to compel her to testify before Congress under oath.
Trump turned his head to the right at the very last moment, so the bullet intended for his head missed. After security swarmed the former president, he got up, raised a fist, and told his followers to “fight.” Republicans confirmed him as their presidential nominee at this week’s national convention in Milwaukee.