US Secret Service acknowledges failures that led to July Trump assassination attempt

By Michael Hernandez

WASHINGTON (AA) - The US Secret Service acknowledged multiple failures Friday that led to an attempt on former President Donald Trump's life in July.

The agency, which is tasked with ensuring the security of presidents, presidential candidates and senior US officials, said an internal review determined that "communications gaps and a lack of diligence" among agents preceded the July 13 shooting at a political rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“It is important that we hold ourselves to account for the failures of July 13 and that we take the lessons learned to make sure that we do not have another mission failure like this again,” Acting Director Ronald Rowe said in a statement.

“What has become clear to me is that we need a shift in paradigm in how we conduct our operations,” added Rowe.

A brief five-page report found that agents failed to use a counter-drone system that would have allowed them to detect the system that Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, flew near the Butler Farm Show venue prior to the ex-president taking the stage.

It also called out communication failures with local law enforcement agencies that led to local police not being able to alert federal agents of a suspicious person on the roof where Crooks opened fire. The breakdown "inhibited the collective awareness of all Secret Service personnel," the report said.

"This failure was especially acute in terms of the FPOTUS/RPN’s protective detail, who were not apprised of how focused state and local law enforcement were in the minutes leading up to the attack on locating the suspicious subject," it said, referring to Trump's protective team.

"If this information was passed over Secret Service radio frequencies it would have allowed FPOTUS/RPN’s protective detail to determine whether to move their protectee while the search for the suspicious suspect was in progress. Vital information was transmitted via mobile/cellular devices in staggered or fragmented fashion instead of being relayed via the Secret Service radio network," it added.