Senior officials from President Joe Biden’s administration have been called to testify before the House Homeland Security Committee about the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump.
Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.) on Tuesday called on FBI Director Christopher Wray, U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to testify at an oversight hearing on July 23.
“The American people want answers about what happened in Pennsylvania on Saturday. Secretaries Mayorkas and Cheatle lead departments and agencies tasked with protecting the homeland and safeguarding our nation’s top officials and candidates,” Greene said in a statement. “Meanwhile, Secretary Wray leads an agency with the enormous responsibility of investigating this assassination attempt.”
The statement further added:
It is essential that we work together to understand what went wrong and for Congress to work with departments and agencies to ensure this never happens again. Successful oversight will require Congress to work with these officials to publicly testify before the House Homeland Security Committee. The American people, and the individuals and families who receive protective services, deserve better than that. [Emphasis added]
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The hearing will focus on the assassination attempt on former President Trump on July 13 in Butler, Pennsylvania, in which a bullet struck him in the ear while he was speaking at a campaign rally, and on which 50-year-old former fire chief Corey Comperatore died while trying to protect his family from the gunfire.
David Duch, 57, and James Copenhaver, 74, were also injured in the assassination attempt but are currently in stable condition.
Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old from Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, is accused of carrying out the assassination attempt after he was shot and killed by Secret Service agents shortly after firing at Trump and other rally attendees.
The FBI, Secret Service and Department of Homeland Security have come under fire as details emerge about how Crooks climbed with a rifle onto a rooftop near where Trump was speaking, even though a bystander had alerted local authorities.
Also this week, green sent They sent a letter to Mayorkas requesting all documents regarding security plans for the area surrounding the Trump rally where the assassination attempt occurred, as well as the briefing materials used to inform Biden about the assassination attempt.
“The significance of this security failure and horrific moment in our nation’s history cannot be understated,” Greene wrote to Mayorkas. “No assassination attempt has come so close to taking the life of a president or presidential candidate since the shooting of President Reagan in 1981. If the bullet’s trajectory had been even slightly different, the assassination attempt on President Trump may have been successful.”
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter. here.
