Two months after Donald Trump narrowly survived an assassination attempt, a gunman hid undetected for nearly 12 hours on the edge of the golf course where Trump played last Sunday, under the protection of an agency that has been pushed to its limits.
As the 2024 presidential election enters its final phase, the U.S. Secret Service is operating with about 400 fewer personnel than authorized by Congress, according to government records.
The issue is unlikely to be resolved before the Nov. 5 election because the agency typically takes more than 200 days to fill open positions.
Since U.S. President Joe Biden ended his reelection bid in July and Vice President Kamala Harris took over as the Democratic nominee in a tight race against Republican Trump, the Secret Service has had to expand its protective coverage to a broader group of authorities.
That has put unprecedented pressure on the agency, according to interviews with three former Secret Service agents and a former head of the department that oversees it.
“The pace, the expectations and the pressure have never been greater than they are now,” Kenneth Valentine, a former agent, said in a telephone interview.
Trump’s desire to play private golf Sunday at one of his Florida clubs meant agents didn’t conduct the kind of routine on-site checks that might have led them to find the alleged killer before Trump got within a few hundred yards of where the man was killed. He had been hiding for hours, with food, near the fifth hole of the Trump International golf course.
Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe — who took over in July when the agency’s longtime leader resigned after Trump narrowly survived his first assassination attempt — says his agents are already working under high levels of stress.
Democrats and Republicans in Congress say they may approve additional funding in the coming weeks. But that will do little in the short term to address staffing shortages that force officers to work long hours in high-pressure situations.
The risk of failure became clear on July 13, when a gunman fired six shots from the top of a building during a Trump rally in Pennsylvania, killing a rallygoer and grazing the Republican nominee’s ear.
Secret Service agents quickly pulled Trump to safety and killed the gunman, but agency leaders acknowledge he never should have been able to fire the gun.
“SHAMEFUL” AGENCY.
Rowe told MPs on July 30 that he was “ashamed” of the safety failures in the crash.
On Sunday, a Secret Service agent spotted the suspected shooter on a Florida golf course, catching a glimpse of the barrel of his AK-47-style rifle. The agent opened fire, driving him away before he had a direct line of sight of Trump or could fire a shot.
The suspect, Ryan Routh, was arrested a short time later.
However, security experts question why the agency did not find it earlier.
“How could Routh not have been seen by a forward team? Did the (Secret Service) use a drone on the golf course? Dogs? If not, why not?” said Lora Ries, who oversaw the Secret Service as a senior official at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during the Trump administration.
Rowe told reporters that Trump’s golf outing on Sunday was not announced to the public, meaning the agency did not organize a major security operation in advance that could have signaled his impending arrival.
Source: Terra
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