The Secret Service didn’t sweep the building from which a gunman tried to kill Donald Trump during a rally on Saturday, instead relying on local law enforcement to secure the location, according to a report.
A spokesperson for the federal agency told CNN that local law enforcement was supposed to be posted in the area, but it’s unclear where the post was intended to be. Two sources familiar with the federal agency’s operations separately told NBC News that the Secret Service had been aware of the risks posed by the building next to the Butler Farm Show—the venue where the rally took place in Butler, Pennsylvania—and had flagged the rooftop as a potential security vulnerability in the days leading up to the attack.
“Someone should have been on the roof or securing the building so no one could get on the roof,” a former senior Secret Service agent told NBC News.
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Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said the agency had worked with local law enforcement in providing security for the event, including positioning sniper teams on rooftops to spot and eliminate threats. No officer had been stationed on the roof of the building from which the gunman—20-year-old Thomas Crooks—eventually opened fire, wounding Trump as well as three rally attendees, including one fatally. Secret Service snipers killed Crooks soon after the attack began.
The building from which he’d fired—owned by a glass research company—was outside the rally’s security perimeter but was nevertheless about 150 yards from the stage where the former president was standing, putting it within range of the type of rifle Crooks was carrying.
Guglielmi said the Secret Service had designated the rooftop as being under the jurisdiction of local law enforcement, which is itself a common practice when providing security at outdoor political events, according to NBC News. Butler County District Attorney Richard Goldinger told the network his office had deployed four “quick response teams” and four sniper teams at the rally Saturday but claimed the Secret Service was responsible for security outside the Butler Farm Show.
“They had meetings in the week prior. The Secret Service ran the show,” Goldinger said. “They were the ones who designated who did what. In the command hierarchy, they were top, they were No. 1.”
Asked about the Secret Service not sweeping the building, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told CNN on Monday that findings and recommendations would be made based on an independent review of the facts surrounding the attack. Earlier in the interview, he described the incident as a “failure” that simply “cannot happen.”
A report in The Washington Post Sunday said Guglielmi confirmed the Secret Service had relied on local police to fill out “significant parts of its typical array of specialized protective units,” including the countersniper teams which spotted and eliminated the gunman.
Butler County Sheriff Michael Slupe further told the Post a municipal officer encountered Crooks while investigating reports of a suspicious man on the roof before the shooting, but the officer was gripping the edge of the roof and couldn’t access a gun when the shooter then pointed his weapon at him. The officer dropped down before the gunman then opened fire toward the rally, Slupe said.
President Joe Biden on Sunday said he’d directed an independent review of the national security at Trump’s rally and asked the head of the Secret Service to review all security measures for the Republican National Convention, which starts Monday. His comments came after Guglielmi publicly denied the “absolutely false” claims that his agency had refused a request for additional protection for Trump before the rally.
“The Secret Service is working with all involved Federal, state and local agencies to understand what happened, how it happened, and how we can prevent an incident like this from ever taking place again,” Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle said in a statement Monday. “We understand the importance of the independent review announced by President Biden yesterday and will participate fully. We will also work with the appropriate Congressional committees on any oversight action.”
The FBI on Sunday said the assassination attempt is being investigated as a potential domestic terrorism incident and that no motive has yet been established for the attack. The bureau is also working to confirm there were no “co-conspirators associated with this attack.”
Even as the Secret Service has come under intense scrutiny for its biggest security failure since the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan in 1981, Trump has repeatedly praised the agents who protected him during the attack. He’s also used some of his first comments to the media since the attack to remark about how close he came to being killed, telling two outlets on Sunday: “I’m supposed to be dead.”
