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Secret Service Gives Update On Trump Assassination Attempt. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired August 02, 2024 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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RONALD ROWE, ACTING DIRECTOR, SECRET SERVICE: Investigations of the July 13th failure being done now by Congress, the Department of Homeland Security's Office of the Inspector General, and the independent review directed by President Biden. Additionally, the Secret Service's Office of Professional Responsibility is currently conducting a mission assurance review. As I stated, I am not willing for the -- I'm not waiting for the completion of those reports, and I've directed the Secret Service to take immediate steps to ensure our protectees are indeed safe. And I will summarize those steps in a moment.

I am committed to pursuing accountability for the Secret Service's failure in Butler, Pennsylvania. But let me be clear. If policy violations by Secret Service personnel are identified by the agency's mission assurance review, those individuals will be held accountable. And they will be held accountable to our fair and thorough disciplinary process. The first part of that process is an investigation to identify whether policy violations occurred.

Potential policy violations are referred to our Office of Integrity, and appropriate discipline is administered under our table of penalties. The facts will drive the outcomes of those investigations and I promise accountability. And I will not rush to judgment nor ignore due process. Every single person within the Secret Service feels the weight of what happened. We are in an unprecedented threat environment and a high operational tempo during this presidential campaign. The men and women of the Secret Service are working incredibly hard and doing their jobs under difficult circumstances. They need to focus on their work, and they need to know that I have their backs, and that is my commitment to them.

I want to thank our state and local partners. The Secret Service relies on local law enforcement for every protective event. Those valiant men and women work tirelessly protecting their communities. They know the people, places, and terrain that we operate in. We owe them our thanks. And simply put, we cannot do our jobs without them. And I know how important this relationship is.

I spent four years in local law enforcement before joining the Secret Service. I know the long hours these men and women put in and the professionalism they bring to this partnership. And in that capacity, I was always proud to support the Secret Service's protective mission when called upon as a municipal police officer.

In no way should any state or local agency supporting us in Butler on July 13th be held responsible for a Secret Service failure. Typically, the Secret Service refrains from commenting on ongoing investigations, but we know these are extraordinary circumstances. So please understand that the information provided today is based on what I know now to a degree of certainty.

We will learn more as interviews are completed and further evidence is gathered and analyzed. And I will share more information as it becomes available. But I can say without a doubt that heroism was present that day. Secret Service agents rushed to the stage to shield the former President with their bodies within three seconds of bullets ringing out in an unflinching act of bravery. The Secret Service counter- sniper who neutralized the threat with a single shot, undoubtedly saved countless lives.

We're in a high operational tempo. And I need and I want our Secret Service workforce, the dedicated men and women of the Secret Service. I want to know, and I want to make sure that they are uplifted so they can focus on carrying out the mission. They are worthy of trust and confidence, and they deserve your support.

And let me take a moment to speak to the American people that are counting on us to do our job, to protect their ability to cast a vote for the candidate of their choice. The Secret Service's successes are largely unknown. You only know of our failures and those that have been documented, and all of them are undeniably dark days in our nation's history.

But let me tell you about the dedicated patriots of the Secret Service. These public servants are the quiet professionals working in the background day in and day out. They are standing the watch, providing a blanket of protection to the people that work in the White House, to the thousands of people who attend political rallies and nominating conventions, to the thousands of American citizens who line

Pennsylvania Avenue every four years on inauguration date to see the new president and the new vice president.

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And they are out there right now doing this mission. They are focused and they live their professional lives committed to the values of this agency, justice, duty, loyalty, courage, and honesty. This is who we are and this is what we do. And we will earn back your trust. I now provide a timeline of the visit to Butler, Pennsylvania.

On July 8th, personnel assigned to the agency's Pittsburgh Field Office conducted planning meetings and a site walkthrough with law enforcement partners and campaign staff. On July 10th, Secret Service counter-sniper and technical security personnel arrived in Pittsburgh and began advanced planning for their teams. July 12th the build out of the campaign rally site began and continued through the early morning hours of July 13th.

In the morning of July 13th, a site briefing was conducted with Secret Service personnel and law enforcement partners supporting the event. Secret Service personnel took their posts and a technical security sweep of the protective site commenced prior to the site's opening to event staff, vendors, and to the public.

At 12:30 p.m., the Secret Service opened the protective site to event staff and vendors. And then at 01:00, magnetometer screening of the estimated 15,000 people attending the campaign rally, then staff and vendors began. At 05:30 p.m. former President Trump arrived at the campaign rally via Secret Service motorcade. And at that time he met with supporters in a secure backstage area within the protective site.

At 05:45 p.m. a, local Butler County Emergency Services Unit counter- sniper team member texted the Secret Service counter-sniper team leader about a suspicious person and sent two photos of the individual later identified as the assailant. At 05:53 p.m. the Secret Service counter-sniper team leader texted the Secret Service counter-sniper teams that local law enforcement was looking for a suspicious individual outside of the perimeter lurking around the AGR building.

At this time, Secret Service personnel were operating with the knowledge that local law enforcement was working on an issue of a suspicious individual. The concept of local law enforcement working on such issues is common at sites. And on July 13 there were over 100 calls for support. At 06:00 p.m., former President Trump took the stage to begin remarks and based on what I know right now, neither the Secret Service counter-sniper teams nor members of the former President's security detail had any knowledge that there was a man on the roof of the AGR building with a firearm.

It is my understanding that personnel were not aware the assailant had a firearm until they heard gunshots. At 06:11 p.m., a member of the former President Trump's protective detail contacted their Pittsburgh field office counterpart to inquire about the radio update that there was an issue local law enforcement was looking into near the perimeter.

At 06:11 p.m., the assailants first volley of three shots was fired. And within 3 seconds, the former President's detail rushed the stage and covered former President Trump, shielding him with their own bodies. The four through (inaudible) shots took place over the next several seconds, 15 and a half seconds after the assailants first shot, a Secret Service counter-sniper fired a single round that neutralized the assailant.

That concludes a quick brief summary of the timeline. And with that, I'll turn it over to our staff here to begin any questions.

UNKNOWN: Good afternoon, sir, (inaudible) in response to (inaudible)

UNKNOWN: Hi, sir. Thank you for doing this. You said earlier this week to Congress that you -- start again. You said earlier this week to Congress that you don't want to tip anything on the scale as far as discipline area action is concerned. I need to ask you, since you testified, has anyone been suspended with or without pay?

Has anyone been fired? And will you tell us as people are disciplined along the way, or is this something we're going to need to just constantly be asking, or will you update and tell us five people have been fired, six people, seven people. What can you tell us? ROWE: Sure. Thank you for that question, David (ph). So as I said in

my opening statement, there are going to be -- there's the mission assurance review.

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If that mission assurance review is looking into -- if there are policy violations. At that point now, if, in fact there were policy violations at that point, now, it'll go into a parallel path of a disciplinary type of investigation. Those are internal investigations that deal with employee matter. So we're not going to be able to provide real time updates or continuously to provide you updates on that. But what I will tell you is that these were very thorough investigations. And if, in fact, there were policy violations and they are substantiated, those employees will be held accountable.

UNKNOWN: I think if I just make sure people want accountability, you may not be able to tell us names or positions or something, but will you be able to say that people have been disciplined? People want to hear that there's some accountability.

ROWE: I will be able to, at least, at a high level, begin provide at least some type of statement that people are being accountable, being held accountable.

UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) you know, I appreciate this. Fox Digital update some video of somebody on the roof, we believe it's the assailant who's going back and forth while President Trump was speaking. What do you make when you see that? How does that go with this (inaudible)?

ROWE: Yeah. So it affirms to me, and again, and you heard this from the FBI, and they're still conducting interviews and looking at this, it even just affirms to me that this was a failure. We should have had better protection for the protectee. We should have had better coverage on that roofline. We should had at least some other set of eyes from the Secret Service point of view, covering that. That building was very close to that outer perimeter and we should have had more of a presence.

And so as far as the timeline running 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, David (ph), this was a Secret Service failure. That roof line should have been covered. We should have had better eyes on that.

UNKNOWN: Thanks, (inaudible). We're going to go to Washington Post, Perry Stein (inaudible).

PERRY STEIN, REPORTER: Yes. Thank you so much for doing this. I have just a quick follow up. Can you describe, you said there were 100 calls for support. What kind -- who those calls came from and what those looked like? And also moving forward, do you anticipate, and if so, what -- any different changes in protocol between how Secret Service communicates or works with local law enforcement specifically as they work to secure events or, you know, other things?

ROWE: Yeah. Thank you for that question. So with regards to calls for support, it was a very hot day that day. There was a lot of not only EMS type of calls to address people, but, you know, there were people that needed some other type of law enforcement assistance. This happens, candidly, happens a lot at outdoor rallies where -- especially on hot days. So there was a lot of traffic, radio traffic on the local net about, hey, I need EMT here. So there was a lot of people that were needing assistance.

With respect to the interoperability. So one of the things that I've directed is I've commissioned a task force. And that task force is going to be leveraging the resources of the Department of Homeland Security. It'll be co-chaired, in all likelihood, by someone from the Secret Service and someone from CISA. And I think we're also going to bring in some state and local law enforcement. The interoperability challenge, it's -- is not an easy fix. It's not as simple as just trying to figure out the local frequency of the agency you're working with and then piping that into your radio network. It requires a substantial technical fix.

In the meantime, before we can get to that, what I need to have is I need to make sure that our folks, when they're out there, we use a counterpart system. On the day in Butler, we had a Pennsylvania state trooper in our security room. They also had a unified command post that had some of the other agencies that were on site that day. It is plainly obvious to me that we were not -- we didn't have access to certain information, not by anybody's fault. It just so happened that there was a sense of urgency, that there might have been radio traffic that we missed. We have to do a better job of that.

So moving forward, in addition to this task force that we'll provide more information on next week as we begin to stand that up, I've also directed all of our SACs, our special agents in charge of field offices across the country to reevaluate where we put our security rooms. If a state or local sets up a unified command post, maybe we need to be in that room as well, as opposed to just being in another room and relying on that counterpart system.

It was so apparent to me that in this incident, in the final 30 seconds, which has been the focus of what happened before the assailant opened fire?

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There was clearly radio transmissions that may have happened on that local radio net that we did not have. And so we have to do a better job of co-locating, leveraging that counterpart system. And this is going to drive our operations going forward.

STEIN: You don't -- you did hear it or that (inaudible)?

ROWE: We did not -- it did not make it over to us, or whether we did not hear it, it just did not make it over to us.

STEIN: (Inaudible)? ROWE: It did not make it to us. And I go back to my opening statement where the members of the detail, they did not -- all they knew that they're the issue -- that the locals were working an issue at the President's 03:00 which would have been off to his right, which is where the shot came from.

UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) turn over back to (inaudible).

UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) the 100 -- sorry, to clarify of the 100 calls that you got roughly that day, I understand a lot of them were heat- related. How many specifically were suspicious people? Was this the only call, the eventual shooter that was a suspicious character? And then also, just to -- can you clarify, did you guys have a drone on site? Did you try to use it? And if not, like, why did you not use the locals offer of the drone?

ROWE: Sure. So as I understand it now, based on the information I have, there were other calls for -- of suspicious individuals. And your other question was about drones?

UNKNOWN: About the drones.

ROWE: Drones, yeah.

UNKNOWN: You have drone on site that was (inaudible)? And if you wanted to read them, you can use it and then I'll (inaudible) of somebody had a drone, why was that?

ROWE: So we did not have a drone on site. We did not put a drone up. Based on the information I have right now, I am aware that there was a request from a local agency to offer to fly a drone on that day. And that is also part of the mission assurance review that I've asked to get some better insight in. One of the other changes that I implemented when I became the Acting Director is we are now going to leverage the use of unmanned aerial systems at sites now.

So we are putting those assets out. And, you know, we should have had better line of sight on some of those high ground concerns. We thought we might have had it covered with the human eye. But clearly, we are going to change our approach now and we are going to leverage technology and put those unmanned aerial systems up.

UNKNOWN: We're going to go to Nicole Sganga with CBS news.

NICOLE SGANGA, CBS NEWS REPORTER: Thank you so much for doing this. You mentioned that there were text messages from Butler ESU to U.S. Secret Service counter-snipers. I'm curious if that is routine. You know, there were two communication channels at the Butler rally. And you referenced earlier this week, it appears that information was stuck or siloed at the state and local channel. What was the plan to relay information from locals, to the Secret Service, initially? What is the protocol? And I just have one follow up.

ROWE: Sure. So Nicole, we use that counterpart system, right? And so the teams, especially on the tactical side, when it comes to the tactical, our counter assault team, they actually had an embed with them from the local tac team. And they had that radio net as well with Pennsylvania State Police. With respect to the counter-snipers, they were using cellular or telephone text communications. At this point, moving forward, what I have directed now is that everybody should be using the radionet.

And if we don't have the ability to pipe in or leverage that counterpart system, that's one of the things that we're looking at now. We should be able to have direct comms with the people that are supporting us. And that's moving forward. That's what I have directed.

SGANGA: So just to clarify, U.S. Secret Service counter-snipers did not have radio communications?

ROWE: Not with the local CS folks that were providing a support. They were basically had an area responsibility independent from where our counter-snipers were securing.

SGANGA: And just the last thing. Did the U.S. Secret service counter- sniper teams that arrived on site on July 10th ever relay line of sight concerns? What came of that? And can you confirm that this was the first 2024 campaign event that counter-sniper teams were assigned to the former President?

ROWE: Sure. As part of their advance, they identified those line of sight, those high ground concerns. And there's a division of labor. With respect to the whether or not this was the first time, it was. It was the first time Secret Service counter-snipers were deployed to support the former President's detail.

UNKNOWN: We have Eileen Sullivan from New York Times.

EILEEN SULLIVAN, NEW YORK TIMES REPORTER: Hi, thank you so much for doing this. I have a question about the review that you did, the picture that you showed in the Senate the other day of the vantage point that the local snipers had.

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How do you know that that's the window that they were actually posted at? Because they're saying that they're on a completely other side of the building. And related to that, has the Secret Service actually interviewed the snipers that were in the AGR building?

ROWE: So thank you for that. So once the FBI had released the Butler Farm Show site, we were able to take custody of it. And we sent the full resources of our Office of Investigations, which included the forensic services division. We did a full site reconstruction. And this is part of our ongoing mission assurance review. And as part of that, that also included the plotting and also trying to identify where not only our personnel were, but also where state and local law enforcement were. And then the second part of your question was?

SULLIVAN: And so, I mean, how did you identify where they were? And have you interviewed the local snipers?

ROWE: So the mission assurance, we will start -- we're starting with our federal personnel and working out. We will get -- if they're willing to be interviewed, we will ask for the local law enforcement on site to be interviewed that day. How we went back and reconstructed that was based on what we had, based on the ops plan, and then also based on what our own folks, as they understood it on the day off.

SULLIVAN: But I mean, you talk a lot about how we may not (inaudible) ask specific (inaudible). So how do you know that they were, you know, in that window, right? If they look back, they couldn't (inaudible). I mean, they're saying, there's no way. They couldn't see any (inaudible) from where they (inaudible).

ROWE: So I think what we will do is we'll let the mission assurance play that out and we'll look forward to interviewing them and definitely getting their side of the story. But what I also want to reiterate is, this was a Secret Service failure. And so they should not be blamed. We're not trying to shift blame to anybody. And that's the important takeaway, that we need our state and local partners out there doing this with us every day.

UNKNOWN: Okay. We're going to Peter Gunders of ABC News.

PETER GUNDERS, ABC NEWS REPORTER: Director, thank you for taking the time. Just a couple questions, if you could walk us through some things to help us better understand. Have you gotten to the bottom of why there was no one stationed on the route from a law enforcement perspective and why there was no one there to secure the building to make sure no one could get up there? Have you gotten any clarity on why those two lapses in security were in place? And I have a couple quick follow ups.

ROWE: Sure. It's something that, again, having been there, you know, the day after I was named the Acting Director, I wanted to put eyes on and go up there and see it. And looking at that site, you know, it really seeing how close that site was to the stage, seeing where it was. It definitely raised a lot of questions in my mind that there should have been physical presence, if not on the roof, that there should have been better security to prevent anyone from getting up on that roof.

So moving forward, we've -- I've directed our Office of Protective Operations and our special operations division now, that when we are up operational and we have counter-snipers out there, that we are working with locals, and that they, in fact, will also be out present. You know, at the very least, the presence of a law enforcement officer can deter a lot of bad activity. Having been a local police officer, I will never know how many crimes I prevented just by being there, just by walking the street and being out there.

And so, moving forward, one of the things that we want to do is we want to deter people from even thinking about trying to do something like this again. And the only way we can do that is leveraging not only the resources that we have, but the resources of our state and locals and putting them out there in an overt presence.

GUNDERS: Two very quick follow ups. You talked the (inaudible) on -- at the hearing the other day about the system that did not operate, that could detect drones. Can you describe a little bit of how that works? Does that go in the sky itself to detect the drones? And then finally, the interoperability issue, I'm clear in terms of that Secret Service radios were not communicating with the locals, but you had people in the command post, right, who, in theory, could hear and know some basics of what was going on, is that -- am I understanding that correctly?

ROWE: So, with respect to the counter, UAS, Peter, I don't want to get into too much sensitive information. But what I can tell you is it allows -- that asset allows the geolocation to be able to plot where a drone is within a certain distance of how we setup.

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So think of it as like geofencing and then being able to pinpoint and detect where that is. And with respect to the agency, that was, you know, we have -- we had Pennsylvania State Police. But it appears that there was, there was really a big sense of urgency going on. And the state and locals were doing everything they possibly could to try to find the assailant. He had already come to their attention. They were actively trying to find him.

And I believe everyone was doing their level best to try to locate him. But there could have been other agencies that were putting out radio transmissions. And this is something that we'll work with the FBI to get further on. But those radio transmissions might have just been back to the unified command post and maybe not have made it over the Pennsylvania state police there. But that's something that we're going to look into and definitely something that we are moving forward. We definitely want to remedy this going forward.

GUNDERS: But you see (inaudible) had some sense that something is going on (inaudible).

ROWE: Yes, that they were working an issue at the 03:00 of the stage.

UNKNOWN: (Inaudible) from Reuters.

UNKNOWN: Thanks for doing this. I wanted to ask you about changes moving forward. Former President Trump has said he wants to continue having outdoor rallies. What specifically will be different at the next rally that wasn't the case in Butler?

And if I could ask a follow up to, do you have information in the 30 seconds after the gunman was confronted on the roof by a local law enforcement officer, that there were local law enforcement trying to communicate with the Secret Service that there was someone on the roof with a gun and that that transmission was the one that was missed?

ROWE: Okay. So with respect to the former President wanting to get back out there, listen, it's a campaign season, right? Candidates want to be out there. They want to be -- whether it's an indoor site or an outdoor site, it's on the Secret Service to make sure that we create a secure environment. And, you know, listen, we identify challenges, we identify concerns, and then it's on us to figure out what we need to do to mitigate that. So if there are going to be future campaign rallies outside, it's going to be on us to make sure that we are providing all the assets and resources to make sure that those sites are indeed secure.

With respect to the radio transmissions, you know, based on, you know, what the FBI -- my colleague from the FBI testified the other day, and they are working on isolating some of those radio frequencies from the state and locals, that there was somebody who did, in fact, radio out that they had seen the individual with a weapon.

What I can tell you is that that piece of information, that vital piece of information, and by no fault of anyone, it was a very stressful situation. It did not make it over. Our detail, our counter- snipers, everyone that was there that day, were operating under the assumption and under the last bit of information they had received that there was an issue that the locals were working at the 03:00. That's the bit of information that we had. Not anything about a weapon.

UNKNOWN: We got Holmes Lybrand of CNN.

HOLMES LYBRAND, CNN REPORTER: I wanted you to address, or if you can, describe the Pittsburgh field office and their level of experience, especially in preparing for events like this. And also, have they explained their thinking and how they defined the perimeter that day?

ROWE: Sure. Thanks, Holmes. You know, our Pittsburgh field office, I don't think there's anybody in the secret Service who is feeling this more than the men and women of our Pittsburgh field office. And I've met with them. And they are down right now. And so when I've met with them the other day, it was very difficult. It's difficult for them. They feel like they let their colleagues down. They feel like they let the country down. And they are wearing this. And it is -- it's open. You can see it. It's an open wound that they are carrying.

They are a very experienced office. And what I will say is they are cooperating with the Mission Assurance. They understand the gravity of this situation. And they are definitely, definitely down right now.

LYBRAND (Inaudible) and one follow up. You test and find out one of Secret Service (inaudible)? I'm curious how the Secret Service can even make assumptions regarding protection because it seems antithetical in the entire protection (inaudible)?

ROWE: Yeah. So when I said it's a failure to challenge our assumptions, meaning the assumption that, hey, that's going to be addressed or that's going to be covered by state and local.