The Patriot Post® · Trump, the Assassin, the Secret Service and Biden's Response

“It’s time to put Trump in a bullseye.”

Those are the ill-timed words Joe Biden used in a political call to action days before the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, which our team covered in real time. (Video.)

There is no direct link between those words and the attempt on Trump’s life, other than they characterize Biden’s caustic campaign rhetoric asserting that Trump is a grave existential threat to democracy. Despicably, less than 24-hours after the attempted assassination, Biden defended his “bullseye” remark targeting Trump, insisting, “I didn’t say crosshairs.”

What follows is a mix of observations and analysis regarding the attack on Trump, the radicalization of an assassin, the cascading failures of the Secret Service to prevent this attack, and the causation connection with the hateful rhetoric spewed by Biden and his leftist cadres.

First, welcome words from Donald Trump from a Pennsylvania hospital hours after the attack:

I want to thank The United States Secret Service, and all of Law Enforcement, for their rapid response on the shooting that just took place in Butler, Pennsylvania. Most importantly, I want to extend my condolences to the family of the person at the Rally who was killed, and also to the family of another person that was badly injured. It is incredible that such an act can take place in our Country. Nothing is known at this time about the shooter, who is now dead. I was shot with a bullet that pierced the upper part of my right ear. I knew immediately that something was wrong in that I heard a whizzing sound, shots, and immediately felt the bullet ripping through the skin. Much bleeding took place, so I realized then what was happening. GOD BLESS AMERICA!

Early Sunday morning, the Trump posted again:

Thank you to everyone for your thoughts and prayers yesterday, as it was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening. We will FEAR NOT, but instead remain resilient in our Faith and Defiant in the face of Wickedness. Our love goes out to the other victims and their families. We pray for the recovery of those who were wounded, and hold in our hearts the memory of the citizen who was so horribly killed. In this moment, it is more important than ever that we stand United, and show our True Character as Americans, remaining Strong and Determined, and not allowing Evil to Win. I truly love our Country, and love you all, and look forward to speaking to our Great Nation this week from Wisconsin.

About the would-be assassin…

The assailant was 20-year-old Thomas Crooks, who was positively identified by photo and DNA analysis. Though I have already seen evidence of his political alliances, some with radical leftwing groups, there is not enough verifiable information to corroborate anything other than he was a disturbed loner with radical beliefs.

Though he had no police record, we do not know if he was afflicted with mental health issues, including the gender disorientation pathology associated with an increasing number of high-profile assailants. However, it had to be clear to the assailant that he was not going to survive this attack, classifying this as “suicide by cop.”

He was immersed in violent media and gaming, as is the case with many high-profile murderers, and ahead of the attack, Crooks posted a message on an online gaming website, “Steam,” that teased his attack: “July 13 will be my premiere, watch as it unfolds.”

A fellow student and friend of Crooks said, “This was, like, a really, really smart kid, like he excelled, and nothing crazy ever came up in any conversation.” Another student described him as being like a lot of smart kids: “He was just an outcast.” Crooks had completed an associate degree in engineering science from Allegheny County Community College in May, and planned to attend Robert Morris University this fall.

He lived with his parents who are both licensed social workers, his father a registered Libertarian and his mother a registered Democrat. Crooks had voted in one election and requested a Republican ballot, though he had mocked classmates for supporting Trump.

Both father and son were members of the same shooting range club, and his father alerted police, that his son had taken his father’s AR-15 rifle earlier in the day, and had not returned home.

From videos and photos of his demeanor and access to his position, the assailant seemed both steady and resolved, signs he had experience as a long-distance rifle shooter. His plan and position had been scouted and rehearsed prior to the attack, including the fact he had a ladder to access that roof, meaning his actions were clearly premeditated.

“The weapon is believed to be an AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle,” according to The Washington Post, which, as was also the case with the New York Times description, did not mislabel the weapon an “assault rifle” as Leftmedia talkingheads and scribes intentionally and ubiquitously tend to do.

Soon after the attack, law enforcement officials confirmed that explosive materials were found in the assailant’s vehicle and his home, and that he had detonation devices on his person.

The FBI will build a behavioral profile of the assailant, but may be pressured to suppress that report if it is determined that his actions were motivated by leftist affiliations and incited by Biden’s rhetoric.

The FBI Laboratory in Quantico accessed his phone and laptop data but as of yet, they have released no conclusions. If it turns out that he had leftist affiliations which influenced this attack, Biden can always find a group of intel experts to claim those affiliations are “Russian disinformation.”

The Secret Service failures and degrees of negligence…

Having been part of perimeter security details in public venues for two presidents early in my career, I have some perspective on presidential protective details then and now.

First, let me be very clear about this — some are going to launch conspiracy theories suggesting this was a government-contrived assassination attempt, some collaborative effort to kill Trump. These assertions are as absurd, patently false and distract from the serious questions about this incident. On such conspiracy claims Secret Service counter-snipers were “red-lighted” from engaging the threat. For the record, overwatch counter-snipers act on the rules of engagement, not some chain of permissions.

However, there are legitimate questions and irrefutable conclusions about this incident, particularly in terms of Secret Service perimeter security and overwatch. But it is important to consider that the timeline of this attack is very compressed, and hindsight being what it is, that should not unduly influence conclusions about negligence.

The biggest challenge for presidential security details is the difficulty of identifying and detecting a “lone wolf” assailant with a very limited social and digital footprint. Thus, the Secret Service takes all necessary measures to ensure that no weapons enters a secure venue perimeter. Additionally, they are charged with ensuring that there are no line-of-sight locations to carry out an assassination attempt against their protectee. The line-of-sight security perimeter “secondary ring” is generally 1,000 meters.

Counter-sniper teams have a very difficult job in a civilian environment, detecting a target and ensuring it is actually a threat. Confirmation of a threat and/or a clear visual assessment of a threat, it the minimal criterion for taking a shot. That is a high bar, to ensure some reporter or supporter looking for a better vantage point outside the security perimeter, does not get shot.

Among the details we know about the Secret Service coverage is that there were two rooftop counter-sniper positions providing overwatch for the Trump rally venue. That is minimal for an open air venue like the Butler Farm Show grounds rally, where they are responsible for eliminating emerging high-ground threats out to 1,000 meters. The counter-sniper teams on either side of Trump and the podium, were adjusting their position in the moments before the assassin’s first shots, and both teams were facing the direction of the assassin, perhaps having heard a radio report about the threat on the unicom channel shared by all law enforcement at such venues. But it is not clear they had any such notice before the first shots were fired at Trump.

We do not know if counter-sniper teams and other security personnel utilized drones for overwatch to enhance the security perimeter, a typical protocol for an outside venue to ensure roof tops and other high grounds were clear of any threat. If the Secret Service did not utilize its drones in this venue, that constitutes leadership negligence.

But, astoundingly, in yet another security breach, we have confirmed that the assailant flew his own drone over the Butler Farm Show grounds area scouting out his shooting field just hours before he shot Trump.

We know that before the attack, Crooks was noticed by perimeter police, who photographed him. He entered the security perimeter with a range finder, and the Secret Service watched him but then lost track of Crooks when he left the secure area. He was spotted again about 30 minutes before the shooting.

As for the next sighting, it is thought that was when spectators yelled to police that Crooks was on the roof with a rifle. However, sources indicate the timeline is as follows: At 17:52 Crooks was spotted on the roof by counter snipers. Ten minutes later Trump walked onto the stage at 18:02. It was another ten minutes before Crooks fired his first shot at 18:12.

So, almost 20 minutes lapsed between the time Crooks was first spotted and Trump was shot – a lot of time accordant to Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), who confirmed “They had identified the shooter as ‘suspicious’ a full 19 minutes before the shooting.”

The assailant climbed a ladder, which as noted previously we believe he pre-positioned there, onto the roof of a manufacturing plant only 135 meters from Trump. It was a position that gave him an unobstructed target vector about level with Trump on the platform. It was a position which the overwatch counter-sniper teams could not easily see because it was on the far side of the shallow roof ridge.

It is highly irregular that this location, and all rooftops with direct line-of-sight to Trump, had not been secured. Kevin Rojek, FBI Special Agent in Charge of the Pittsburgh office which is investigating the assailant, said “It is surprising” that the assailant was able to access the rooftop, but more on “all the details of that will come out later in the investigation.”

Moreover, immediately behind the assailant’s rooftop was another building with a higher rooftop, which should have had a security team providing overwatch, but again, this was just outside the Secret Service venue security perimeter, and that had not been coordinated with state and local police who secured the outer perimeter.

As for why there was no security overwatch on that rooftop, it’s because security personnel were inside the building rather than atop it.

Asked about that, Secret Service Director Kim Cheatle, who got her job with the help of Jill Biden after having been on her security detail during the Biden/Obama years, responded: “That building in particular has a sloped roof at its highest point. And so, you know, there’s a safety factor that would be considered there that we wouldn’t want to put somebody up on a sloped roof.”

Seriously, she made that claim. The shallow pitch of the rooftops that the two counter-sniper overwatch teams were on, was greater than the roof pitch where the shooter was located, and clearly there was no danger posed by any of the roof-pitch angles.

Cheatle then said, “So, you know, the decision was made to secure the building, from inside.”

From the inside? What? The unmitigated incompetence of this DEI hire is staggering, and deadly.

We know that police near the assailant’s rooftop position were alerted about a man with a rifle minutes before he fired at Trump, and an officer confronted the assailant, but retreated when Crooks pointed his rifle at the officer. It was then, knowing his position had been compromised, that Crooks turned and fired several shots at Trump.

About that, Cheatle said: “The shooter was actually identified as a potential person of suspicion. Unfortunately, with the rapid succession of how things unfolded, by the time that individual was eventually located, they were on the rooftop and were able to fire off at the former president.”

“They”? Who is “they”? Is that some kind of pronoun nonsense.

For the record, when spectators are yelling to police that there is a man on the roof with a rifle, that does not constitute a “potential person of suspicion,” that constitutes and imminent threat.

What we don’t know about the security detail overwatch coverage is, who knew what and when.

If one or both of the Secret Service rooftop sniper teams were aware of an individual with a rifle prone on a rooftop 135 meters line-of-sight from Trump’s podium, how was the assailant able to get multiple shots off without being engaged before taking those shots? I suspect the time between those snippers being alerted to the threat and the time the first shots were fired, was a matter of a few seconds.

We should learn more about the timeline of who actually knew what and when broken down in second-by-second detail as the FBI investigation progresses, but this is clear: Anybody on a rooftop within shooting range of that venue constitutes a violation of Secret Service security perimeter protocol, though some within the agency will try to spin this as having been outside their security perimeter.

The Secret Service is responsible for coordinating all law enforcement security in the area, not just within the venue.

If they had this assailant threat in their sites and failed to engage the threat immediately before the shots were fired, that is indicative of negligence. If they had not spotted the assailant on the roof, they should have. However, we don’t know that, and armchair analysis about negligence is speculation.

But this is NOT speculation: An assailant was able to shoot at a former president and current leading presidential campaign contender, firing several rounds from a distance that clearly was within a kill range for any assailant with modest ability. One of those bullets slightly wounded Trump, but the trajectory was just a few millimeters from being a fatal shot.

Notably, our nation was just millimeters from what would likely have resulted in a significant outbreak of civil unrest.

This constituted the most profound of Secret Service security protocol failures. The facts may eventually confirm degrees of negligence, but what is indisputably clear is that someone almost killed Donald Trump within a controlled venue, and that constitutes a colossal failure by his security detail and other agencies involved.

House Oversight Committee member Mike Waltz (R-FL), a combat-decorated Green Beret, noted, “I’ve been talking to agents this morning, and they are upset, they’re demoralized, they’re angry. [President Trump] should’ve had a much bigger package and detail.”

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-TN), a decorated combat special operator flight surgeon, is leading the inquiry of DHS officials to determine the degree of negligence, as outlined in a letter to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

All being said, from my perspective on review, based on the security detail response on the podium platform, the exit strategy and other Secret Service presence, the security coverage was far below what one would expect for a former president who is now the leading presidential contender. We have confirmed, ahead of the Republican National Convention starting today, that Trump will now receive a presidential-level security detail. (By the way, all those Democrats who, in April, recently wanted to exclude Trump from Secret Service protection apparently have gone back down their ratholes.)

Biden’s response…

Biden’s 2024 campaign theme has been built on this claim, which he repeats ad nauseam: “Trump is a genuine threat to this nation. He’s a threat to our freedom. He’s a threat to our democracy. He’s literally a threat to everything America stands for.”

It is worth noting that just 24-hours before the attack on Trump, at a Detroit rally, Biden spewed this hate-filled screed:

Above all else, we’re going to stand up for our Constitution and save our democracy. … Donald Trump is a loser. … Do you really want to go back to the chaos of Donald Trump… Most importantly, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart, Trump is a threat to this nation. He led a violent mob on January 6th to overturn the 2020 election, to hold onto power. … But Trump is even more dangerous now. No, I’m serious. He’s unhinged. He snapped. … Trump said if he wins, he’ll be a dictator on day one. He means it, folks. … Over my dead body will it happen. … [He] will deploy the Department of Justice to prosecute Trump’s energy — Trump e- — Trump’s en- — Trump’s enemies, and that’s a real deal. Trump’s enemies. Trump himself calls his campaign — the campaign — this is what he calls it, “revenge” and “retribution.” That’s what he said. … [He] will hire tens of thousands of civil servants… Thave to take a loyalty oath to Trump beforehand. … Another four years of Donald Trump is deadly serious — deadly serious. His proposals are deadly serious. … Folks, this race is about your family. It’s about your freedom. It’s about democracy. Are we going to stop Donald Trump?

But the attack on Trump caused, at least for a moment, Biden and his cadre to pause their campaign theme centerpiece, Biden’s incessant “Trump is a dictator and a threat to democracy” claims.

Just hours after the Trump attack, Biden pulled all his campaign advertising, including an ad released two days before the attack calling the former president “a dictator” and “a threat to freedom in the United States.”

Former Trump Attorney General William Barr was clear in his assessment about the abject absurdity of such erroneous claims: “The Democrats have to stop their grossly irresponsible talk about Trump being an existential threat to democracy. He is not.”

Biden briefly suspended his campaign of fear, hate and division asserting Trump is the “enemy of democracy,” and shifted to his “President Unity” facade, in an effort to divert attention from his incendiary campaign rhetoric.

In the first 24 hours after the attack, Biden booked four different appearances, desperately trying to pull the Leftmedia attention back to his campaign, and endeavoring to distance his campaign’s rhetorical vilification of Trump as causation.

Shortly after the shooting Saturday, Biden declared, in a mumbling condemnation: “There is no place in America for this kind of violence. It’s sick. It is one of the reasons we have to unite this country. … But the idea — the idea that there’s political violence or violence in America like this is just unheard of. It was just not appropriate. And we — everybody — everybody must condemn it. Everybody.”

Really? “Not appropriate”? Do ya think?

This from the man who has spent the last eight years propagating fallacious and highly inflammatory assertions that Trump and his supporters are a perilous “threat to democracy.” Democrats have waged a vile eight-year-long campaign of personal destruction to demean and otherwise dehumanize Trump and his supporters.

This from the man who is also directly responsible for the historic surge in political violence across our nation ahead of the 2020 election in the Demos’ choreographed “Summer of Rage” riots, while they simultaneously demoted and defunded law enforcement capabilities, exacerbating the lawlessness. That unmitigated and mostly un-prosecuted urban violence by Demo constituents, their Marxist Black Lives Matter and antifa movement radicals, spilled over into record violence in the subsequent years of Biden’s term.

“President Unity” was back Sunday afternoon with more diversionary duck-and-cover chatter to divert from his inflammatory campaign rhetoric.

Biden again insisted, “There is no place in America for this kind of violence or for any violence for that matter.” He added: “Unity is the most elusive goal of all, but nothing is [more] important than that right now — unity. … We must unite as one nation. We must unite as one nation to demonstrate who we are.”

Biden claimed, “I’ve directed an independent review of the national security at yesterday’s rally to assess exactly what happened. And we’ll share the results of that independent review with the American people as well.” We will see.

Then again Sunday night, Biden addressed the nation with more of the same, attempting to distance his inflammatory rhetoric from the attack on Trump:

We cannot — we must not go down this road in America. … There is no place in America for this kind of violence or for any violence ever. Period. No exceptions. We can’t allow this violence to be normalized. You know, the political rhetoric in this country has gotten very heated. It’s time to cool it down. And we all have a responsibility to do that. … Disagreement is inevitable in American democracy. … But politics must never be a literal battlefield and, God forbid, a killing field. … I’ll continue to speak out strongly for our democracy [and] call for action at the ballot box, no violence on our streets. … In America, we resolve our differences at the battle [sic] box. … Here in America, while unity is the most elusive of goals right now, nothing is more — more important for us now than standing together.

Fact is, there is no place in America for Biden’s accusations about Trump being a dictator, ad nauseam. One indisputable consequence of Biden’s extreme rhetoric is the rise of deranged sociopaths, one of whom attempted to assassinate his political opponent.

Biden offered no mea culpa for leading the chorus of that hateful rhetoric against Trump, and closed with more “democracy” chatter: “We must be an American democracy where arguments are made in good faith, an American democracy where the rule of law is respected, an American democracy where decency, dignity, fair play aren’t just quaint notions but living, breathing realities.” He violates those tenets with every breath.

Of course, there was no pause in Biden’s Leftmedia talkinghead parroting of his hate rhetoric. Columnist Christine Flowers noted that the weekend of the assault, she “counted at least 127 times on the combined networks of CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC and CBS that Trump was called ‘a threat to democracy, 'or variations of that phrase.”

For context regarding all of Biden’s faux “democracy” rhetoric, as I have noted, the proliferation of this campaign theme is very deliberate in its obfuscation about the founding tenets of American Liberty. When he autocratically demands that you “support democracy,” he means the statist authoritarian rule of democratic socialism, now the foundational platform of his Democrat Party.

Of course, Biden’s notion of “democracy” is the antithesis of our nation’s founding tenets, and in that sense Trump is an enormous threat to Biden’s statist authoritarian “democracy.” That reveals Biden and his leftist Demo cadres are the real threats to our Republic and Liberty.

But that rhetorical vitriol is all Biden has to run on, because his administrative record of domestic and foreign policy failures have been a disaster, though his core constituents are too dullard to distinguish fact from the plethora of now-familiar lies Biden feeds them about his policy record – and too blinded by their chronic Trump Derangement Syndrome to care. (Virtually non of Biden’s lies are subject to Leftmedia “fact-checks.”)

The 24-hour pause in Biden’s hateful rhetoric was predictable. Asked the day the GOP convention convened, 48 hours after the assassination attempt, if the Biden campaign message was going to change, his deputy campaign agitator, Quentin Fulks, made clear, “It hasn’t changed.”

To that end, Biden resumed his divisive rhetoric at another rally, declaring: “How do you talk about the threat to democracy, which is real…? Do you just not say anything, because it may incite somebody?” Biden insisted out of one side of his mouth, “Our politics have become too heated,” adding, “We all have a responsibility to lower the temperature” Then out of the other side, he affirmed he will keep the heat on high: “Just because we must lower the temperature in our politics as it relates to violence doesn’t mean we should stop telling the truth.”

All said, let me make this point: Trump’s campaign rhetoric is equally strident, but Trump is focused on Biden’s failed domestic and foreign policy record, and NOT calling Biden a “dictator” or a “threat to democracy.” In fact, when Trump was shot, he was turning toward a panel listing the massive illegal immigration under Biden. Had he not turned toward that graphic, he would have suffered a potentially fatal wound.

It is ironic that Trump had turned to face that screen and was talking about Biden’s open border policy, because in Mexico, there were almost 60 candidates assassinated ahead of the June elections this year.

(By the way, expect Biden to pivot and spin this attack as a “gun problem” to advance his leftist gun control agenda.)

Finally, the man killed by the assailant was Corey Comperatore, a former local fire chief who dove onto his family to protect them. According to his daughter: “The media will not tell you that he died a real-life super hero. They are not going to tell you how quickly he threw my mom and I to the ground. They are not going to tell you that he shielded my body from the bullet that came at us. He loved his family. He truly loved us enough to take a bullet for us.” He will be buried Thursday.

One of the critically wounded is 57-year old David Dutch, a former Marine who was hit in the liver and stomach, but bunched a shirt against his wound and walked off the bleachers before asking for help. James Copenhaver, 74, was the other wounded attendee, and both men are in stable condition.

Trump set a fund for the Comperatore family and other victims, which has now raised almost $5 million.

For the Comperatore family and the families of others wounded, we offer our prayers.

Updates

“Secret Service Whistleblowers on the Trump Security Detail.”

“Secret Service Director Resigns After Stonewalling Congress.”

(Updated)