Internal Report Details Secret Service Failures Before Trump Assassination Attempt

WASHINGTON (AP) — A new report says the Secret Service’s communication breakdown with local law enforcement affected its ability to do its job before the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump in July. The report lists instances where opportunities were missed to stop a gunman who opened fire from an unsecured rooftop.

A five-page document summarizing the Secret Service report’s key findings singles out local and federal law enforcement, highlighting a series of widespread failures that preceded the July 13 shooting at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in which Trump was shot and injured in the ear.

The botched response has been well-documented in congressional testimony, news media investigations and other official statements, but the report released Friday is the Secret Service’s most formal attempt to clean up its mess, and comes as new investigations continue after authorities arrested a man in Florida on Sunday who they allege wanted to kill Trump.

“It is critical that we take responsibility for the failure of July 13 and use the lessons learned to ensure that such a mission failure never happens again,” Secret Service Acting Director Ronald Lowe Jr. said in a statement released along with the release of the agency’s internal investigation report.

The report details a series of “communication lapses” before 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks fired eight shots at Trump from the roof of a building less than 150 yards from where he was speaking, and was then fatally shot by a Secret Service sniper. It’s clear that the Secret Service knew the venue was a security hazard even before the shooting.

Among the problems: Some local police officers on the scene didn’t realize there were two communications centers there, meaning the Secret Service couldn’t pick up their radios.

Law enforcement also relayed vital information off the Secret Service’s radio spectrum. While police were searching for Crook before the shooting, details were transmitted “in a stepwise or piecemeal manner via mobile/cellular devices” rather than over the Secret Service’s own network.

The report stated that “the collective awareness of all Secret Service personnel was impaired as a result of personnel failing to radio in the presence of a suspicious individual on the roof of the AGR complex or to notify all federal personnel on site at Butler of critical information received from local law enforcement.”

The breakdown was particularly troubling for Trump’s security detail, which “was unaware of how focused state and local law enforcement was on finding a suspicious subject in the minutes leading up to the attack,” the report said. Had they known, they could have decided to move Trump while the search was underway.

The report raises more serious questions about why no law enforcement officers were stationed on the roof where Crook climbed before opening fire.

The second floor of the complex where Crooks fired his shots was home to a local tactical team. While several law enforcement agencies questioned the effectiveness of the team’s location, “there was no subsequent discussion about changing that location,” according to the report. And despite the fact that snipers from local law enforcement “apparently did not object to that location,” there was no discussion about deploying the Secret Service and the team on the roof.

The tactical team operating on the second floor of the building had no contact with the Secret Service prior to the rally. According to the report, the team was brought in by the local police department to assist with the event without the Secret Service’s knowledge.

The Secret Service knew in advance that the location chosen by Trump’s staff as better able to accommodate “the large number of attendees” would pose security concerns due to the visibility that could be exploited by potential attackers. Yet the report found that no security measures were taken on July 13 to address those concerns, and that the Secret Service lacked detailed knowledge of the local law enforcement support that would be provided.

The report’s summary does not identify any specific individuals responsible or say whether any employees were disciplined, but the Associated Press previously reported that at least five Secret Service agents were assigned to altered shifts. Kimberly Cheatle, who was director at the time, resigned more than a week after the shooting and said she took full responsibility for the mistake.

The Secret Service investigation is one of many, including oversight probes by Congress and the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General.

Lowe said the July shooting and Sunday’s incident — in which 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Rouse was arrested after Secret Service agents noticed a rifle poking through shrubs where Trump was playing golf in West Palm Beach, Florida — demonstrate the need for a paradigm shift in the agency that protects public officials.