Video shows shooter on the roof Why the Secret Service missed the Trump assassin
Less than 150 meters away from Donald Trump, the assassin set up his position on a rooftop. Visitors drew attention to him by shouting. The police and the Secret Service now have to face tough questions.
15.07.2024, 20:35
16.07.2024, 09:59
dpa
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- The attack on Donald Trump has triggered a wave of criticism of the Secret Service, which was responsible for protecting the former US president.
- A former Secret Service officer described the Secret Service's failure to spot the shooter on the roof as a "gross failure".
- The assassin positioned himself on a rooftop 120 meters from the stage and opened fire ten minutes into Trump's speech.
- Although Secret Service snipers eventually took out the attacker, one audience member was killed and two others seriously injured.
- Experts criticized the security measures and called for a thorough investigation into the incident.
Following the attack on former US President Donald Trump, a storm is brewing over the Secret Service security forces that were supposed to protect the Republican candidate with the support of the Pennsylvania State Police at the election rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Matt Shoemaker, former Secret Service officer and Republican politician, described the incident to "Business Insider " as a "gross failure" on the part of the bodyguards. It was unbelievable that a suspected shooter on a roof could have been overlooked, who had a clear line of fire to the podium.
The course of the attempted attack raises many questions about the security arrangements. Trump, one of the most controversial figures in American politics, is strongly polarizing the country. The availability of firearms in the USA further increases the risk of such fatal incidents.
Sniper positioned himself 120 meters away
Witnesses and officials reconstructed that shortly after Trump's speech began, the shooter climbed onto the roof of a single-storey building with a semi-automatic assault rifle, about 120 meters from the speaker's stage.
Trump took the stage an hour late and began his speech on illegal immigration. Ten minutes later, the assassin opened fire. Many of those present initially mistook the bangs for fireworks.
One shot hit Trump in the right ear and slightly injured him. The bodyguards reacted immediately, shielded Trump and returned fire. However, one bullet killed a spectator behind Trump and two other people were seriously injured.
"A mistake in the planning"
The Secret Service snipers immediately returned the attacker's fire and killed him. About a minute later, Trump and his bodyguards stood up again. The presidential candidate raised his fist several times and was escorted to his limousine amid chants of "USA" from the audience.
Meanwhile, footage and videos from the audience showed the lifeless body of the assassin on the roof of the building.
The building on which the shooter had set himself up belongs to the company "American Glass Research" and was outside the security perimeter. Visitors to Trump's events normally have to go through a security check, but this building went unnoticed.
Former FBI agent Steve Moore is astonished: "The fact that someone allowed this roof to go unobserved and unguarded could have been a mistake in planning or execution."
Republican announces investigation
Retired FBI agent Bobby Chacon also expressed surprise that no one was guarding the roof, which he described as a "perfect vantage point". "This building is the closest one with a clear line of sight to the stage. I'm shocked they didn't have someone on that roof," Chacon told CNN.
The FBI will lead the investigation and focus on the security plan. Donald Mihalek, a former Secret Service agent, told The Wall Street Journal that venues are usually inspected in advance to create a security plan. However, outdoor events are a challenge, he said, because you can't lock down entire cities.
Video shows shooters on the roof
An attendee at the event told the BBC on Saturday evening that he and others had seen the shooter climb onto the roof several minutes before the shots were fired.
They had been able to clearly see that the man was armed and had pointed this out to the police. They also tried to draw the attention of the security forces, who were positioned on a barn roof with binoculars and looking in the direction of the audience, to the danger by making gestures.
Videos on Tiktok and X show Crooks crawling around unchallenged on the roof. Visitors to the event loudly drew attention to him. According to a report by the AP news agency, one police officer even climbed onto the roof, but then turned back.
In the agents' blind spot?
New findings now show that the assassin's sniper position on the roof was apparently largely in the Secret Service agents' blind spot.
FBI agent Moore also assumes that the Secret Service could not have fired immediately. He told CNN, "You can't just say, 'Oh, there's someone on the roof' and shoot him. What they have to do is look and wait until they see a gun. The problem is that in that area on the roof, there could be a wall covering him."
"The bad guys only have to get lucky once"
Moore is certain that there will be "drastic changes" to security procedures after the Trump assassination, including expanding security zones and securing venues more carefully. "The Secret Service has to be perfect every single time. The bad guys only have to get lucky or right once," Moore summarized.
James Comer, Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, announced that an investigation into the assassination would be launched. "I have already asked the Secret Service for a briefing and am also asking the Director of the Secret Service to appear at a hearing," Comer said.
Secret Service director under fire
The attempted attack on former President Donald Trump has not only revealed the Secret Service's security gaps, but has also had political consequences. Mike Johnson, majority leader of the Republicans in the House of Representatives, announced a comprehensive investigation on the X news platform. He emphasized that the representatives of the security services would be summoned to appear before parliamentary committees as soon as possible.
Kimberly Cheatle, Director of the Secret Service since 2022, is at the center of the criticism. She is being heavily attacked on social media in particular. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and owner of the news platform X, used his extensive reach to target Cheatle.
Donald Trump satisfied with Secret Service
On Saturday evening, Musk announced his official support for Trump's presidential candidacy and sharply criticized Cheatle. "So before she was given the responsibility of protecting the president, she was guarding 'Cheetos' packs," Musk wrote polemically.
Cheatle, who had a long career in the Secret Service before her three-year stint at PepsiCo, is regarded by many as an experienced professional. President Joe Biden, who appointed her back to the security service as Director in 2022, got to know her during his time as Vice President, when she was part of his protective detail.
One thing is clear: the failed attempt on Trump's life is a nightmare for the Secret Service and will have consequences. Donald Trump, however, said that the Secret Service "did a fantastic job".
1865: Abraham Lincoln - killed: Abraham Lincoln was the first US president to be killed by assassination. While attending a special performance of the comedy "Our American Cousin" at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., he is shot in the back. The perpetrator is John Wilkes Booth, an actor and fanatical supporter of the Confederates, who had been defeated in the Civil War two days earlier. Booth shoots the president in the head at close range with his single-shot pistol. Lincoln is brought unconscious into a neighboring building and given medical treatment. The next morning, Lincoln is dead. As it turns out, the assassination is part of a conspiracy against several members of the US government. Lincoln's assassin Booth is later shot dead, four co-conspirators, including a woman, are hanged three months later.
Image: Imago/Kena Images
1881: James Garfield - killed: The assassination attempt on American President James Garfield also ends fatally. On July 2, 1881, six months after his inauguration, Garfield was shot at a train station in Washington, D.C.. His murderer, Charles Guiteau, a 39-year-old lawyer and former supporter of his, is said to have been dissatisfied with not getting a job in Garfield's administration. Other sources describe him as mentally disturbed. The American doctor and inventor Alexander Graham Bell tried to find and remove the bullet in Garfield's chest using a specially developed device. In vain: the president died of blood poisoning a few weeks later and Guiteau was executed in June 1882.
Image: Imago/Gemini Collection
1901: William McKinley - killed: US President William McKinley is shot at close range in Buffalo, New York, in September 1901. After a speech at the Pan-American Exposition, he was shaking hands with several people when the anarchist Leon Czolgosz pointed a gun at him and pulled the trigger. At first it appears that the injuries are not fatal, but then gangrene sets in and McKinley dies. Assassin Czolgosz is executed in the electric chair.
Image: Imago/Gemini Collection
1912: Theodore Roosevelt - survived: This X-ray shows Roosevelt's chest after the attempted assassination in October 1912. "Teddy", as Roosevelt was also known, is attacked in Milwaukee shortly before an election campaign appearance. By this time, he had already served two terms as president and was running again as an independent candidate. Roosevelt is not seriously injured: a spectacle case and the folded manuscript of his speech muffle the shot. The perpetrator, John Schrank, is arrested and spends the rest of his life in psychiatric hospitals.
Image: Imago/UIG
1933: Franklin D. Roosevelt - survived: Donald Trump speaks under a huge photo of President Franklin Roosevelt during an event to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day. A few weeks before being sworn in as president, Roosevelt is giving a speech from the back of his open car in Miami in February 1933 when five shots are fired. Roosevelt is not hit, but the mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak, who is speaking to Roosevelt, is injured and dies 19 days later. The perpetrator is sentenced to death.
Image: imago images/ZUMA Press
1950: Harry S. Truman - survives: In November 1950, Truman is staying at Blair House opposite the White House when two gunmen break in. Truman is not injured in the assassination attempt, but a White House police officer and one of the assailants are killed in the exchange of gunfire and two other White House police officers are wounded. The shooter, Oscar Collazo, is sentenced to death. In 1952, Truman commutes the sentence to life imprisonment. The photo shows the assassin Oscar Collazo, who is taken to an ambulance seriously injured.
Image: Imago/Granger Historical Picture Archive
1963: John F. Kennedy - killed: The photo shows the Kennedys in Dallas in their open vehicle a few minutes before the fatal shots are fired at the motorcade. Two rifle shots are fired during the assassination. Lee Harvey Oswald is arrested as a suspect and killed two days later in police custody by nightclub owner Jack Ruby. More than 2000 books have been written about the assassination - and yet the murder remains a mystery to this day: conspiracy theories were soon circulating, but all the evidence pointed back to a single perpetrator with a thirst for revenge.
Image: imago images/Everett Collection
1968: Robert F. Kennedy - killed: Robert F. Kennedy, brother of the assassinated President John F., is shot dead as a US presidential candidate in 1968 at the age of 42 at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles by a 24-year-old Palestinian named Sirhan Sirhan. The seriously injured Kennedy is said to have whispered in the ear of the paramedics who rushed to lift him from the floor onto a stretcher: "Don't lift me." His last words before he lost consciousness. Despite a four-hour operation, his condition remained critical. Kennedy is pronounced dead 26 hours after the assassination.
Image: Imago/Pond5 Images
1972: George C. Wallace - survives: Like Trump, George Wallace is a presidential candidate, but for the Democrats. In 1972, he is shot at a campaign event in Maryland. As a result, he is paralyzed from the waist down. Wallace wins the primaries in Maryland, Michigan, Tennessee and North Carolina and speaks in a wheelchair at the Democratic National Convention in Miami in the summer of 1972. However, he is not nominated as a presidential candidate.
1975: Gerald Ford - survived: Not quite as close as Trump: The photo shows Ford flinching when shot during the assassination attempt by Sara Jane Moore. The bullet, fired from a distance of twelve meters, misses Ford by just twelve centimeters. Ford is doubly lucky: this is the second assassination attempt within three weeks. In the first attempt, Charles Manson supporter Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme points a semi-automatic weapon at him. However, the gun does not go off.
Image: imago images/Everett Collection
1981: Ronald Reagan - survived: President Reagan has just given a speech at the Hilton Hotel in Washington D.C. and waves to his fans on his way to the motorcade. Then shots are fired. Seconds after the shots are fired, reporters and Secret Service agents manage to push the assassin to the ground and hold him down. Reagan narrowly escapes with his life, three other people are injured. The criminal proceedings against the assassin Hinckley later end with an acquittal by reason of insanity. Shortly before the emergency operation in hospital, the Republican Reagan is said to have asked the surgical team: "Please tell me you're all Republicans."
Image: Imago/Everett Collection
2005: George W. Bush - survived: George W. Bush visits Georgia in 2005 and takes part in a rally in Tbilisi with the then President Mikhail Saakashvili when a hand grenade is thrown. The grenade missed Bush by about 100 meters and did not explode, although it was live. A red handkerchief wrapped tightly around it is said to have prevented the safety lever from being released. The Georgian assassin Vladimir Arutyunian is sentenced to life imprisonment.
Image: Wikipedia
2011: Barack Obama - survived: A man from Idaho shoots at the American president's official residence from a parked car. The bullets narrowly miss the guards. Unlike their younger daughter Sasha, the incumbent President Barack Obama and his wife were not in the White House at the time. After his arrest, Oscar Ortega-Hernandez admits that he wanted to kill Barack Obama. He is sentenced to 21 years in prison for attempted murder. As with Trump, the assassination attempt led to discussions about the role of the Secret Service, which was also accused of failure at the time.
Image: Imago/ABACAPRESS
2024: Donald Trump - survived: On July 13, a young American carries out an attack on Donald Trump at an election rally in Pennsylvania. Trump survives the attack with minor injuries to his right ear. One spectator is killed and at least two other people are seriously injured. The 20-year-old perpetrator, Thomas Matthew Crooks, is shot dead at the scene by the Secret Service.
Image: AP
1865: Abraham Lincoln - killed: Abraham Lincoln was the first US president to be killed by assassination. While attending a special performance of the comedy "Our American Cousin" at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., he is shot in the back. The perpetrator is John Wilkes Booth, an actor and fanatical supporter of the Confederates, who had been defeated in the Civil War two days earlier. Booth shoots the president in the head at close range with his single-shot pistol. Lincoln is brought unconscious into a neighboring building and given medical treatment. The next morning, Lincoln is dead. As it turns out, the assassination is part of a conspiracy against several members of the US government. Lincoln's assassin Booth is later shot dead, four co-conspirators, including a woman, are hanged three months later.
Image: Imago/Kena Images
1881: James Garfield - killed: The assassination attempt on American President James Garfield also ends fatally. On July 2, 1881, six months after his inauguration, Garfield was shot at a train station in Washington, D.C.. His murderer, Charles Guiteau, a 39-year-old lawyer and former supporter of his, is said to have been dissatisfied with not getting a job in Garfield's administration. Other sources describe him as mentally disturbed. The American doctor and inventor Alexander Graham Bell tried to find and remove the bullet in Garfield's chest using a specially developed device. In vain: the president died of blood poisoning a few weeks later and Guiteau was executed in June 1882.
Image: Imago/Gemini Collection
1901: William McKinley - killed: US President William McKinley is shot at close range in Buffalo, New York, in September 1901. After a speech at the Pan-American Exposition, he was shaking hands with several people when the anarchist Leon Czolgosz pointed a gun at him and pulled the trigger. At first it appears that the injuries are not fatal, but then gangrene sets in and McKinley dies. Assassin Czolgosz is executed in the electric chair.
Image: Imago/Gemini Collection
1912: Theodore Roosevelt - survived: This X-ray shows Roosevelt's chest after the attempted assassination in October 1912. "Teddy", as Roosevelt was also known, is attacked in Milwaukee shortly before an election campaign appearance. By this time, he had already served two terms as president and was running again as an independent candidate. Roosevelt is not seriously injured: a spectacle case and the folded manuscript of his speech muffle the shot. The perpetrator, John Schrank, is arrested and spends the rest of his life in psychiatric hospitals.
Image: Imago/UIG
1933: Franklin D. Roosevelt - survived: Donald Trump speaks under a huge photo of President Franklin Roosevelt during an event to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day. A few weeks before being sworn in as president, Roosevelt is giving a speech from the back of his open car in Miami in February 1933 when five shots are fired. Roosevelt is not hit, but the mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak, who is speaking to Roosevelt, is injured and dies 19 days later. The perpetrator is sentenced to death.
Image: imago images/ZUMA Press
1950: Harry S. Truman - survives: In November 1950, Truman is staying at Blair House opposite the White House when two gunmen break in. Truman is not injured in the assassination attempt, but a White House police officer and one of the assailants are killed in the exchange of gunfire and two other White House police officers are wounded. The shooter, Oscar Collazo, is sentenced to death. In 1952, Truman commutes the sentence to life imprisonment. The photo shows the assassin Oscar Collazo, who is taken to an ambulance seriously injured.
Image: Imago/Granger Historical Picture Archive
1963: John F. Kennedy - killed: The photo shows the Kennedys in Dallas in their open vehicle a few minutes before the fatal shots are fired at the motorcade. Two rifle shots are fired during the assassination. Lee Harvey Oswald is arrested as a suspect and killed two days later in police custody by nightclub owner Jack Ruby. More than 2000 books have been written about the assassination - and yet the murder remains a mystery to this day: conspiracy theories were soon circulating, but all the evidence pointed back to a single perpetrator with a thirst for revenge.
Image: imago images/Everett Collection
1968: Robert F. Kennedy - killed: Robert F. Kennedy, brother of the assassinated President John F., is shot dead as a US presidential candidate in 1968 at the age of 42 at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles by a 24-year-old Palestinian named Sirhan Sirhan. The seriously injured Kennedy is said to have whispered in the ear of the paramedics who rushed to lift him from the floor onto a stretcher: "Don't lift me." His last words before he lost consciousness. Despite a four-hour operation, his condition remained critical. Kennedy is pronounced dead 26 hours after the assassination.
Image: Imago/Pond5 Images
1972: George C. Wallace - survives: Like Trump, George Wallace is a presidential candidate, but for the Democrats. In 1972, he is shot at a campaign event in Maryland. As a result, he is paralyzed from the waist down. Wallace wins the primaries in Maryland, Michigan, Tennessee and North Carolina and speaks in a wheelchair at the Democratic National Convention in Miami in the summer of 1972. However, he is not nominated as a presidential candidate.
1975: Gerald Ford - survived: Not quite as close as Trump: The photo shows Ford flinching when shot during the assassination attempt by Sara Jane Moore. The bullet, fired from a distance of twelve meters, misses Ford by just twelve centimeters. Ford is doubly lucky: this is the second assassination attempt within three weeks. In the first attempt, Charles Manson supporter Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme points a semi-automatic weapon at him. However, the gun does not go off.
Image: imago images/Everett Collection
1981: Ronald Reagan - survived: President Reagan has just given a speech at the Hilton Hotel in Washington D.C. and waves to his fans on his way to the motorcade. Then shots are fired. Seconds after the shots are fired, reporters and Secret Service agents manage to push the assassin to the ground and hold him down. Reagan narrowly escapes with his life, three other people are injured. The criminal proceedings against the assassin Hinckley later end with an acquittal by reason of insanity. Shortly before the emergency operation in hospital, the Republican Reagan is said to have asked the surgical team: "Please tell me you're all Republicans."
Image: Imago/Everett Collection
2005: George W. Bush - survived: George W. Bush visits Georgia in 2005 and takes part in a rally in Tbilisi with the then President Mikhail Saakashvili when a hand grenade is thrown. The grenade missed Bush by about 100 meters and did not explode, although it was live. A red handkerchief wrapped tightly around it is said to have prevented the safety lever from being released. The Georgian assassin Vladimir Arutyunian is sentenced to life imprisonment.
Image: Wikipedia
2011: Barack Obama - survived: A man from Idaho shoots at the American president's official residence from a parked car. The bullets narrowly miss the guards. Unlike their younger daughter Sasha, the incumbent President Barack Obama and his wife were not in the White House at the time. After his arrest, Oscar Ortega-Hernandez admits that he wanted to kill Barack Obama. He is sentenced to 21 years in prison for attempted murder. As with Trump, the assassination attempt led to discussions about the role of the Secret Service, which was also accused of failure at the time.
Image: Imago/ABACAPRESS
2024: Donald Trump - survived: On July 13, a young American carries out an attack on Donald Trump at an election rally in Pennsylvania. Trump survives the attack with minor injuries to his right ear. One spectator is killed and at least two other people are seriously injured. The 20-year-old perpetrator, Thomas Matthew Crooks, is shot dead at the scene by the Secret Service.
Image: AP
