Trump Assassination Attempt Task Force Determines ‘Failures’ with Secret Service Leadership

On Tuesday, the Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump released its final official report, determining that there were “failures in the planning, execution, and leadership” of the United States Secret Service (USSS) leading up to both attempts on the President-elect’s life.

As reported by Breitbart, the task force’s five-month investigation focused on both the attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13th and the second attempt in West Palm Beach, Florida on September 15th. In the former attempt, President-elect Trump was wounded by gunfire in his right ear, while one rallygoer was killed and two others were critically injured, before the gunman was killed by the Secret Service. In the second attempt, the gunman was spotted by Secret Service and fled before firing a shot, and was arrested later the same day.

“The report text, unanimously approved by the Task Force on December 5, highlights significant failures in the planning, execution, and leadership of the Secret Service and its law enforcement partners,” the task force declared in a press release summarizing its findings. “The Task Force-approved report also proposes 37 actionable recommendations related both to the security failures on July 13 and to overarching structural changes that the Secret Service and Congress must consider to strengthen security measures and prevent similar security failures in the future.”

With regards to the July 13th attempt, the task force’s report noted that, rather than any one singular moment that allowed the gunman to nearly assassinate the then-former president, there had instead been “various failures in planning, execution, and leadership” which created “an environment in which the former President” and the audience at the rally were “exposed to grave danger.”

Almost immediately after the first attempt, the Secret Service faced widespread and bipartisan condemnation for the obvious security failures that allowed the 22-year-old gunman to gain access to a nearby rooftop with an entire rifle in hand. Multiple civilians spotted the armed and suspicious-looking man and tried to point him out to law enforcement, who apparently did nothing in response to these warnings. His motives remain unknown.

By contrast, the response to the second attempt in Florida was much swifter. An agent noticed the barrel of the gunman’s rifle protruding from the bushes at the Trump International Golf Course, where then-candidate Trump was playing a round of golf. The Secret Service opened fire, scaring the gunman away, before he was apprehended later by local law enforcement. The second would-be assassin, Ryan Wesley Routh, had become a fanatical supporter of Ukraine since the start of their war against Russia, and was apparently motivated by what he perceived as insufficient support for Ukraine by former President Trump.