Police had alerted US Secret Service of gunman’s presence during Trump shooting

By André Goudsward And Pitas from the coastReuters

The acting director of the U.S. Secret Service said Friday that local police in Pennsylvania warned of a gunman on a rooftop before the July 13 assassination attempt on Donald Trump, but the message did not reach his agents in time.

Local authorities and Secret Service agents were using different communication channels, preventing the warning from getting through before a 20-year-old attacker opened fire on the Republican presidential candidate, acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe told reporters.

“In the last 30 seconds – which was the focal point of what happened before the assailant opened fire – there were clearly radio transmissions that could have occurred on that local radio network that we didn’t have,” Rowe said.

Rowe said the FBI, the agency leading the criminal investigation into the shooting, is working to determine exactly what was communicated. But Rowe said investigators believe “someone did radio in that they saw the individual with a weapon.”

A local police officer confronted the gunman on the roof of the industrial building where he eventually opened fire. But the officer, who had been lifted by a colleague, fell to the ground about 30 seconds before the assailant began shooting, law enforcement said.

At the time the shots rang out, the Secret Service was aware that local police were dealing with a problem outside the event, but did not know there was a weapon, Rowe said.

In congressional testimony Tuesday, Rowe blamed the failure on local law enforcement, while saying he was “ashamed” of the security lapse on the day of the shooting. Rowe also noted that the Secret Service was not present at the command post set up by local law enforcement in Butler, Pennsylvania, for the former president’s outdoor campaign rally.

The first shooting of a U.S. president or major-party presidential candidate in more than four decades is a glaring security failure that led to the resignation last week of former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle under bipartisan pressure from Congress.

Authorities said Thomas Crooks, 20, fired the shots that injured Trump’s right ear, killed one rallygoer and wounded two others with an AR-15-style rifle before law enforcement snipers shot and killed him.

– Reuters