(Red State)—There’s a new report from the General Accountability Office that has some troubling information when it comes to the protection that the Secret Service was providing to President Donald Trump before the assassination attempt on him in 2024, in Butler, Pennsylvania:
The report, ordered by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, reveals that the Secret Service received classified intelligence regarding a threat to Trump’s life 10 days before the rally, but failed to share the information with other key agencies. It also identified a series of procedural and planning mistakes, including “misallocation of resources, lack of training and pervasive communication failures” that led to the near assassination.
“One year ago, a series of bad decisions and bureaucratic handicaps led to one of the most shocking moments in political history,” Grassley said. “The Secret Service’s failure on July 13 was the culmination of years of mismanagement and came after the Biden administration denied requests for enhanced security to protect President Trump. Americans should be grateful that President Trump survived that day and was ultimately reelected to restore common sense to our country.
Even if it were classified, you can still identify what you could from aspects that would be non-classified or at least say there was an active threat. They didn’t even tell the local law enforcement teams or Trump’s protective team about this threat, which you would think would be basic for preparation in Butler. Basic, assuming you wanted to protect him. Local law enforcement told the GAO that if they had known, they would have provided more forces.
The Secret Service also turned down the campaign’s requests for more security. That’s crazy if they knew of this threat somewhere in the chain of command.
Another question was that the Secret Service agent who was supposed to be checking for “site vulnerabilities” was new, so this was the first time she was a part of planning such an event.
This was also a stunner – Trump almost didn’t have those snipers that took out the assassin, the GAO said:
Secret Service officials denied the Donald Trump Protective Division’s request for enhanced counter Unmanned Aerial Surveillance (cUAS) equipment at the Butler event, as “these resources had already been allocated for the Republican and Democratic National Conventions.” Fortunately, senior officials with knowledge of the threat against Trump stepped in to approve counter sniper assets for the rally, a decision which was described as “inconsistent” with agency practices for making resource decisions.” Absent this last-minute decision, Trump “would likely not have received the counter sniper assets that ultimately took out [Crooks],” the GAO wrote.
- Read More: redstate.com
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