The technology flaws of the US Secret Service helped the gunman who attempted to assassinate Donald Trump during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last month evade detection.
An officer broadcast “long gun!” over the local law enforcement radio system, according to congressional testimony from the Secret Service this week, the New York Times reported.
The radio message should have travelled to a command center shared between local police and the Secret Service, but the message was never received by the Secret Service.
Around 30 seconds later, the shooter, Thomas Crooks, fired his first shots.
It was one of several technology issues facing the Secret Service on 13 July due to either malfunction, improper deployment or the Secret Service opting not to utilize them. The Secret Service had also previously rejected requests from the Trump campaign for more resources over the past two years.
The use of a surveillance drone was turned down by the Secret Service at the rally site and the agency also did not bring in a system to boost the device of agents’ signals as the area had poor cell service. And a system to detect drone use in the area by others did not work, according to the report in the New York Times, due to the communications network in the area being overwhelmed by the number of people gathered at the rally. The federal agency did not use technology it had to bolster their communications system.
The shooter flew his own drone over the site for 11 minutes without being detected, around two hours before Trump appeared at the rally.
Ronald Rowe Jr, acting Secret Service director, told Senators that the agency had technological tools that could have spotted the shooter and allowed the agency to detain and interrogate him prior to the shooting, but that they weren’t utilized. Rowe assumed the role after the Secret Service chief, Kimberly Cheatle, resigned shortly after the assassination attempt on Trump and a grilling on Capitol Hill.
Rowe testified that he did not know or understand why the Secret Service did not include the warehouse from its secure perimeter or why a countersniper was not assigned to the roof that the gunman used.
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Chris DeMunbrun, a former Secret Service officer, told the New York Times he resigned in 2017 over frustration with the agency’s delays in evaluating new technology and getting clearance and funding to obtain it and then train officers on it.
At the rally, the Secret Service also failed to record communications between federal and local law enforcement.