Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe on Friday admitted that at the July 13 campaign rally for former President Donald Trump, the Secret Service was aware that local law enforcement was “working an issue” off to Trump’s right — where the shots would come from — but still could not explain how they missed the shooter until he fired.
During a press briefing, Rowe told reporters that all Secret Service members present at the rally knew was that “locals were working in issue at the President’s three o’clock — which would have been off to his right which is where the shot came from.”
He also said, “Our detail, our counter snipers, everyone that was there that day, were operating under the assumption, [and] under the last bit of information they received that there was an issue that the locals were working at the three o’clock. That’s the bit of information that we had, not anything about a weapon.”
However, Rowe could not explain why — knowing there was an issue at Trump’s right — Secret Service were still not able to stop Crooks sooner. Rowe said a Secret Service counter-sniper fired at Crooks fifteen-and-a-half seconds after Crooks began firing.
A recently released video recorded by one of the injured victims at the rally obtained by Fox News showed Crooks running atop the roof, clearly visible from where he was sitting behind Trump.
Asked about the video, Rowe did not explain how the Secret Service missed Crooks.
“As far as the timeline of him running back and forth, I know the FBI has provided a bit of a chronology as well. And so I’d have to go back and look at that. But the bottom line is…this was a Secret Service failure. That roofline should have been covered. We should have had better eyes on that,” he said.
Rowe claimed at the briefing that Secret Service never saw Crooks on the rooftop “with a firearm” until he fired at Trump, but did not specify when exactly they first saw Crooks.
Earlier this week, Rowe told Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) at a hearing that Secret Service did not see Crooks on the rooftop at all — with or without a firearm — until he fired at Trump.
However, ABC News reported on July 18 that Secret Service had seen Crooks on the rooftop 20 minutes before he fired at Trump.
The assassination attempt is under multiple investigations, by the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Secret Service, the Department of Homeland Security inspector general, the White House, and members of Congress in the House and Senate, as well as a bipartisan congressional task force.
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