The US Secret Service will be provided with additional military support capabilities for presidential and vice presidential candidates ahead of the upcoming election in November, representatives of the agency and the Pentagon announced on Thursday.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has directed US Northern Command to plan and provide additional support and resources for the Secret Service at various locations during the election, according to Pentagon spokesperson Sabrina Singh.
A Secret Service spokesperson said the US Department of Defense had been providing the service with additional assistance, which includes “logistics, transportation and communications, through the 2024 campaign season.”
The representative noted that this support had been granted following the assssination attempt on former US President Donald Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13.
Trump narrowly escaped death when 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire on him from a nearby rooftop. The would-be assassin fired several shots, one of which struck the Republican candidate’s ear. One rally attendee was killed in the attack and two others were seriously injured before Secret Service snipers eliminated the shooter. The assassination attempt has since been investigated by the FBI but Crooks’ motives remain unclear.
Following the incident, the Secret Service said it was “ashamed” of the security lapse that allowed the incident to occur. The head of the service, Kimberly Cheatle, who had served as director of the agency since August 2022, was forced to resign following widespread outcry over her failure to protect the former president.
Trump, meanwhile, has expressed gratitude to the Secret Service agents who were protecting him that day, and has instead accused Vice President Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden of “making it very difficult to have proper staffing in terms of Secret Service,” as well as using rhetoric that could “get assassins or potential assassins going.”
“Maybe that bullet is because of their rhetoric,” Trump told TV host Dr Phil earlier this week.
The former president also suggested that it was God who spared his life that day, and that his survival of the assassination attempt was a sign that he had a mission to save America and, perhaps, the world.