The new GAO report exposes the failures of the secret service at the Trump rally in Butler

A new report by the Federal Government Accountability Office (GAO) describes the security failures of the American secret services during the first attempted assassination of the candidate of the time, Donald Trump, during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, a year ago.

The report, ordered by the president of the Senate judicial committee, Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, reveals that the secret services have received classified information concerning a threat to Trump’s life 10 days before the rally, but did not share the information with other key agencies. He also identified a series of procedural errors and planning, in particular “a bad allocation of resources, lack of training and omnipresent communication failures” which led to the nearby assassination.

“A year ago, a series of bad decisions and bureaucratic disabilities led to one of the most shocking moments in political history,” said Grassley. “The failure of the secret service on July 13 was the culmination of years of poor management and came after the Biden administration refused increased security requests to protect President Trump. The Americans should be grateful that President Trump survived that day and was finally re-elected to restore common sense to our country.

Trump, whose campaign had requested an increased guarantee but was refused by the Biden administration, was grazed in the right ear while addressing the crowd. The secret service agents invaded him, but he got up when he was jostled in safe, raised his fist in the air and exhibited the horrified spectators to “fight, fight, fight”. A man in the crowd, Cory Comperatore, was killed protecting his family, while two others were injured. A 20 -year -old local man, Thomas Crooks, was shot down by counter elite shooters while he is crouching on the roof of a neighboring building.

“There were mistakes, and that shouldn’t have happened,” Trump told her daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, on Fox News.

‘Absolut bare minimum’: calls for more action after the secret service agents are suspended for a security failure

President Donald Trump is surrounded by American secret service agents during a campaign rally on July 13, 2024 in Butler, Pennsylvania. (AP photo / Evan VUCCI)

GAO is the main auditor of the US government. His probe almost a year is the longest review of the assassination attempt to date. The main conclusions include:

• Ten days before the event, high -level secret services were informed of a classified threat to Trump. “Once these officials have examined the information, they could have asked for the staff in their chain of command is informed of specific information.” Officials have not shared this information, leaving federal and local entities to apply the plan and staff of the event ignoring the active threat, including members of the Donald Trump protection division. Local officials of the law application told GAO that they would have asked additional assets for the Butler rally, if they had known.
• The secret service agent who was responsible for the “vulnerabilities of identification of the site”, was new in his role. The Butler event was “its first planning and obtaining a major outdoor event as an agent of the site”.
• At the time of the Butler event, the secret services did not have an official policy to communicate the requests of a personnel for the protection of changes in the security plans. A member of Trump’s campaign staff had asked the Advance secret service team, who was not aware of the active threat to Trump, not to use large agricultural equipment to respond to the concerns of the aim near one of the buildings so as not to interfere with the photos of the press in the campaign. The advanced team has complied, a decision that may have given Crooks a lighter blow on the scene of its perch on the roof.
• The secrets of the secret services rejected the request for the Donald Trump protection division for unlikely air surveillance equipment (CUAS) during the Butler event, because “these resources had already been allocated to national republican and democrats.” Fortunately, senior officials knowing the threat against Trump intervened to approve the elite counter-title assets for the rally, a decision that was described as “incoherent” with agency practices to make resource decisions. “In the absence of this last -minute decision, Trump” would probably not have received the assets of Sniper de Comptoir until ultimately taken (Crows), “wrote Gao.

Fox News confirmed before the one -year birthday of Trump’s first assassination attempt that six secret service agents were suspended without salary after Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, opened fire in Trump during a rally in the west of Pennsylvania last summer.

Changes in the secret services The agency made a post-Trump assassination attempt

Supervisors and agents at the line level received suspensions ranging from 10 to 42 days without salary in February, confirmed the secret services to Fox News.

And the news occurs as a senator Ron JohnsonR-Wis., Approved an assignment to the FBI and the Ministry of Justice for more information on the assassination of the butler.

Johnson, who presides over the permanent subcommittee of investigations, was co-author of the Bipartite Senate Internal security Committee of the Committee on the Assassination attempt last year.

The presidential candidate and former president of the time, Donald Trump, reacts while several shots sounded during a campaign rally at Butler Farm Show in Butler on July 13, 2024. (Reuters / Brendan McDermid)

On the house side, the working group on the assassination attempt published his final report On December 5, 2024, highlighting the “important failures of planning, execution and the management of the secret services and its law enforcement partners”.

The report concludes that the shooting was “avoidable”, identifying poor preliminary planning, lack of coordination with local police and the poor coordination of secret services by American secret services. He proposed 37 “usable recommendations linked to both security failures on July 13 and overall structural changes” the secret services should adapt to the increase in security measures in the future.

The reports of the Senate and the Chamber followed testimonies from the Congress, in particular the deputy director of the FBI in acting, Paul Abbate, the director of the FBI Christopher Wray and the director of the secret services Ronald Rowe, who recognized “the failure” of the agency in Butler.

President Donald Trump is assisted by the staff of American secret services after shots were reassembled during a campaign rally at Butler Farm Show in Butler on July 13, 2024. (Reuters / Brendan McDermid)

The director of secret services, Kimberly Cheatle, resigned from the agency less than a week after Trump’s assassination attempt in the midst of increasing pressure, assuming “full responsibility for the security forfeiture”.

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One day after Butler, the FBI announced its federal investigation into the shooting, appealing to an attempted assassination and a potential act of domestic terrorism.

Alexis McAdams and Alex Miller de Fox News contributed to this report.