A whistleblower has accused Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe Jr. of reducing resources for a critical threat assessment team, which led to the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
The whistleblower’s claims, shared with Republican Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, center on the Secret Service’s Counter Surveillance Division (CSD), which is responsible for assessing security threats at event sites.
According to the whistleblower, the CSD did not perform its usual evaluation before the July 13 rally, leaving potential security risks unchecked.
The whistleblower alleged that this lapse in security allowed 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, the shooter, to approach the event without being apprehended.
“This is significant because CSD’s duties include evaluating potential security threats outside the security perimeter and mitigating those threats during the event,” Senator Hawley wrote in a letter to Rowe.
Hawley further claimed that if the CSD had been present, Crooks would have been “handcuffed in the parking lot” after being spotted with a rangefinder.
The whistleblower also accused Rowe of personally directing significant cuts to the CSD, reducing its manpower by up to twenty percent.
This alleged reduction in resources was not disclosed in Rowe’s testimony before the Senate, despite direct questions about manpower changes.
Further complicating the situation, the whistleblower claimed there was a culture of retaliation within the Secret Service against those who raised security concerns.
Following an event at a golf tournament last August, some Secret Service personnel reportedly voiced worries about inadequate security measures due to reliance on local law enforcement, who were not properly trained for such events.
These concerns, according to the whistleblower, were met with retaliation rather than action.
The Secret Service has responded to these allegations through spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi, who stated that they respect the oversight role and will respond to Senator Hawley’s requests through official channels.
The incident has raised serious questions about the Secret Service’s ability to protect high-profile individuals, especially given the nearly 90-minute gap between identifying a suspicious person and the eventual spotting of Crooks just minutes before gunfire rang out.
A recent poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research highlights growing public concern about the Secret Service’s effectiveness.
The poll reveals that only around 3 in 10 Americans have strong confidence in the agency’s ability to protect presidential candidates. Furthermore, about 7 in 10 Americans believe the Secret Service bears at least moderate responsibility for the attempt on Trump’s life.
The poll also reflected broader concerns about the state of security and political divisions in the U.S., with half of the respondents attributing significant responsibility for the attack to political polarization.
Republicans and Democrats, however, diverged in their views on the causes, with Republicans more likely to blame the Secret Service and Democrats more concerned about the availability of firearms.
The agency’s handling of security at the rally, and the alleged lack of a proper threat assessment, are under intense scrutiny as the investigation continues.