The head of a prominent police union, Patrick Yoes, expressed frustration at the acting head of the U.S. Secret Service for shifting blame to local authorities after a failed assassination attempt on former President Trump. Yoes criticized the Secret Service for not providing answers almost three weeks after the incident and for assigning blame to local agencies.
The gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, shot Trump in the ear from the roof of a nearby building during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. The Secret Service faced criticism for security lapses that allowed Crooks to get close to the former president.
Yoes likened Rowe’s remarks to a general blaming a tank driver for losing a battle and called for the Acting Director to focus on finding out what went wrong before blaming local law enforcement partners. Rowe testified that the Secret Service was told by local law enforcement that the building would be covered, but questioned why there was not better coverage and why the assailant was not seen.
Yoes emphasized the importance of clarifying which agency is responsible for security at events and which agency placed the buildings beyond the security perimeter. He highlighted the cascade of failures that occurred during the event, leading to an innocent man’s death and a former president being struck by gunfire.
The Secret Service has been called upon to provide more clarity on the security failures that allowed the assassination attempt to occur. The incident raises questions about coordination between different law enforcement agencies and the protocols in place for protecting high-profile individuals during public events. Additional scrutiny is being placed on the Secret Service to ensure that such security lapses do not happen in the future.
