Staff Reports
Whistleblowers have dropped a bombshell about the security arrangements on the day former President Donald Trump faced an assassination attempt. In a shocking twist, it turns out that the majority of the agents supposedly there to protect the former commander-in-chief weren’t even from the Secret Service. Instead, they were members of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) who breezed through only a brief online training session. Who knew that safeguarding a former president could be as easy as logging onto a webinar and hitting “play”?
Senator Josh Hawley from Missouri, who serves on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, has stated that these whistleblowers uncovered significant training deficiencies that led to a dangerous situation at the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. A man named Thomas Matthew Crooks managed to open fire on Trump and attendees because the so-called security detail was made up of inadequately trained personnel. Apparently, a two-hour Zoom seminar is all it takes to ensure the safety of high-profile individuals nowadays—if the sound works, that is.
Hawley didn’t mince words during a recent appearance on Fox News, emphasizing the sheer absurdity of sending a former president into a crowd with a security team unfamiliar with proper protocols. He pointed out that this lack of rigorous training and qualifications may have given Crooks an unfortunate advantage on that fateful day. Giving such responsibilities to agents who barely scraped by on a hair-raising online tutorial is, in fact, outrageous.
There’s also a soupçon of drama with the Secret Service and FBI playing coy by withholding crucial information regarding the attempt on Trump’s life. Thanks to the whistleblowers, this troubling information has trickled out, shining a spotlight on what some have described as a “loose” security operation at the event. It seems the agencies tasked with protecting the nation’s leaders might have been more concerned with PowerPoint slides than actual protection.
In a recent letter to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Hawley detailed several glaring security oversights on the day of the rally. He highlighted the absence of detection canines that are typically deployed to sniff out potential threats and noted how unauthorized individuals managed to sneak backstage. He also pointed out that security personnel were absent from critical locations, making the event more like a benign picnic than a high-stakes political rally. All in all, the picture painted here raises substantial questions about the dedication of agencies responsible for keeping the former president safe, leaving many to wonder what might have happened if the training had been a bit more comprehensive—and the stakes considerably higher.
