Officials shared new details regarding the timeline of the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump and additional background on the shooter during a Senate hearing Tuesday.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God.
00:05A critical part of the Secret Service mission is protecting our nation's current
00:09and former government leaders.
00:12The attempted assassination of former President Donald J. Trump
00:15on Saturday, July 13, 2024, in Butler, Pennsylvania, was a failure on multiple levels.
00:24Since my appointment as the acting director one week ago,
00:27I identified gaps in our security on July 13 and have implemented corrective actions.
00:33One of my first actions as acting director was traveling to the Butler Farm Show site
00:38to better understand how our protection failed.
00:41I went to the roof of the AGR building where the assailant fired shots,
00:46and I laid in a prone position to evaluate his line of sight.
00:52What I saw made me ashamed.
00:55As a career law enforcement officer and a 25-year veteran with the Secret Service,
01:00I cannot defend why that roof was not better secured.
01:04To prevent similar lapses from occurring in the future,
01:07I directed our personnel to ensure every event site security plan
01:13is thoroughly vetted by multiple experienced supervisors before it is implemented.
01:19It is clear to me that other protective enhancements
01:21could have strengthened our security at the Butler event.
01:24I've heard your calls for accountability, and I take them very seriously.
01:29And given the magnitude of this failure,
01:31the Secret Service's Office of Professional Responsibility
01:34is reviewing the actions and decision-making of Secret Service personnel
01:39in the lead-up to and on the day of the attack.
01:43If this investigation reveals that Secret Service employees violated agency protocols,
01:48those employees will be held accountable to our disciplinary process.
01:52But I do not believe that inadequate time to plan for this event was a factor in the failure.
01:59As you saw in my written statement,
02:01I am prepared to provide an overview of the security planning leading up to
02:04and during the July 13th attack.
02:06However, I would like to point out that based on what I know right now,
02:10neither the Secret Service counter-sniper teams
02:13nor members of the former president's security detail
02:16had any knowledge that there was a man on the roof of the AGR building with a firearm.
02:23It is my understanding those personnel were not aware the assailant had a firearm
02:27until they heard gunshots.
02:29Prior to that, they were operating with the knowledge that local law enforcement
02:33was working an issue of a suspicious individual prior to the shots being fired.
02:38I regret that information was not passed to Congress and the public sooner with greater frequency.
02:44And I fear this lack of information has given rise to multiple
02:48false and dangerous conspiracy theories about what took place that day.
02:52And I want to debunk these theories.
02:55Let me address one conspiracy directly.
02:58The Secret Service counter-sniper neutralized the assailant
03:02within seconds after the assailant fired his weapon.
03:06That counter-sniper had full discretion to use deadly force
03:10to stop an attacker and did not need to seek authorization to fire.