Trump Assassination Attempt Task Force Finds 'Failures' with Secret Service Leadership, Planning

The Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump released its final report, finding that there were “failures in the planning, execution, and leadership” of the United States Secret Service.

“Today, the Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump released adopted report text, ‘Final Report of Findings and Recommendations,'” the press release said. “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-approved report also proposes 37 actionable recommendations related both to the security failures on July 13 and to overarching structural changes the Secret Service and Congress must consider strengthen security measures and prevent similar security failures in the future.”

The report from the Task Force explained that during its five-month investigation, “the Task Force interviewed witnesses, obtained and analyzed evidence, and held hearings” regarding the July 13 assassination attempt at President-elect Donald Trump’s Butler, Pennsylvania, rally, and the assassination attempt in September while Trump was golfing at Trump International Golf Course West Palm Beach.

“The full record of evidence clearly shows failures in advance planning by the Secret Service and its law enforcement partners in the days before the July 13 campaign event in Butler, Pennsylvania, and failures in execution on the day of the event itself,” the Task Force said in the report. “The Task Force’s investigation also identified preexisting conditions and leadership failures that set the stage for tragedy.”

The Task Force noted that while there had not been “a singular moment or decision that allowed Thomas Matthew Crooks to nearly assassinate the former President,” there had been “various failures in planning, execution, and leadership” on the day of the rally and prior to the rally that created “an environment in which the former President” and rallygoers were “exposed to grave danger:”

The Task Force found that the tragic and shocking events in Butler, Pennsylvania were preventable and should not have happened. There was not, however, a singular moment or decision that allowed Thomas Matthew Crooks to nearly assassinate the former President. The various failures in planning, execution, and leadership on and before July 13, 2024, and the preexisting conditions that undermined the effectiveness of the human and material assets deployed that day, coalesced to create an environment in which the former President—and everyone at the campaign event—were exposed to grave danger. Conversely, the events that transpired on September 15, 2024, in West Palm Beach, Florida, demonstrated how properly executed protective measures can foil an attempted assassination.

The Task Force noted that there were “several decision points that, if handled differently, could have prevented Crooks from firing eight shots at the Butler rally,” such as the “failure to secure a recognized high-risk area immediately adjacent to the venue.”

“The failures that led to the tragic events of July 13 were not entirely isolated to the campaign event itself, or the days preceding it,” the report continued. “Preexisting issues in leadership and training created an environment in which the specific failures identified above could occur. Secret Service personnel with little to no experience in advance planning roles were given significant responsibility, despite the July 13 event being held at a higher-risk outdoor venue with many line of sight issues, in addition to specific intelligence about a long-range threat.”

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) has previously revealed that whistleblowers have claimed that most of the agents who had been assigned to Trump’s Butler rally, had been Department of Homeland Security personnel who had undergone “a short online training session.”

The report from the Task Force comes months after Trump was shot by “a bullet that pierced the upper part” of his right ear during his Butler rally after Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire from the rooftop of a nearby building.

On September 15, Ryan Wesley Routh was apprehended after a U.S. Secret Service member saw the barrel of his AK-style rifle through the fence — as Routh had been hiding in the bushes near Trump International Golf Course West Palm Beach, where Trump had been playing golf that day.

As Breitbart News’s Alana Mastrangelo previously reported, the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s office later revealed that backpacks, an AK-style rifle with a scope, as well as a Go-Pro camera, had been discovered where Routh had been hiding.