By Jasper Ward
WASHINGTON, July 2 (Reuters) – The U.S. Secret Service did not receive 102 local radio transmissions about the gunman who attempted to assassinate President Donald Trump at a 2024 campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, according to a government watchdog report released on Thursday.
The agency was unaware of the transmissions on July 13, 2024, because it had failed to establish a joint communications room with local law enforcement, which was receiving reports about the search for a suspicious person later identified as Thomas Crooks, according to the report by the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general.
“Instead, we found that the Secret Service received only five phone calls and three text messages about Crooks,” the report notes.
“As a result, Secret Service members did not alert President Trump’s protective detail about concerns of a suspicious person.”
Crooks, who was shot and killed by law enforcement at the rally, opened fire while Trump was speaking on stage. A bystander was killed and others were injured, including Trump, when a bullet grazed his ear.
Crooks had accessed a nearby rooftop with a direct line of sight to Trump.
Recommendations in the inspector general’s report covered such areas as information sharing and addressing “line of sight vulnerabilities” ahead of events.
In a statement, the Secret Service said that it concurred with the inspector general’s recommendations.
“Many of these recommendations were already identified … and have since been implemented as part of our ongoing reform efforts,” a spokesperson said.
The report found Crooks flew a drone over the area hours before he carried out the shooting. The flight was undetected because the Secret Service counter drone system was inoperable, it said.
The counter drone system was manned by a single “under-trained” operator who did not test it before the event, according to the inspector general.
It took the operator hours to attempt to fix the issue, according to the report, which said during this time the suspect conducted his nearly nine-minute drone flight undetected.
Thursday’s report was the latest in a series of investigations by government watchdogs and congressional panels that identified major shortcomings in the Secret Service’s security arrangements for the event.
(Reporting by Jasper Ward in Washington; editing by Ross Colvin, Donna Bryson and Rod Nickel)
