A Secret Service sniper argues that the attack on former President Donald Trump exposed weaknesses in Secret Service security and makes new assassination attempts on presidential candidates inevitable before Election Day, he said in a scathing letter circulating within the agency.
“This institution needs to change. If not now, when? Another assassination attempt in 30 days?” read the letter, first published by RealClearPolitics.
“We should be prepared for new attempted attacks before November. Our leadership has shown that we are unable to protect our leaders.”
A law enforcement source confirmed the letter’s authenticity to The Washington Post.
The document was sent Monday to all uniformed personnel of the Secret Service, the police force responsible for White House security.
The shooter demanded the resignation of senior Secret Service officials, accusing them of dereliction of duty by rank-and-file Secret Service employees.
“Unfortunately, we did not achieve our goal for many years. It was just luck and things seemed to work. I shared the idea with my boss as well as others… the less experienced ones were simply ignored as they somehow knew more than I did,” the letter read.
“Secret Service supervisors ‘knew better’ and the troopers on the ground made the best of a bad situation.”
He also said the reputation of the Secret Service and all of its employees had been tarnished by the blunder on July 13 that resulted in President Trump being shot in the ear and a heroic firefighter standing behind him being killed. The sniper called that day a “stain that will never go away.”
The identity of the counter-sniper who wrote the letter is unknown. They described themselves as Marine Corps veterans who had been with the Secret Service’s counter-sniper team for more than 20 years.
The Secret Service’s handling of the former president’s security has come under intense scrutiny since the tragic assassination attempt.
Law enforcement sources previously told The Post that as many as 30 seconds passed between when local police confronted the gunman, Thomas Crooks, and when the first shot was fired at Trump, raising questions about why Trump was allowed to remain onstage.
The acting director of the Secret Service said Tuesday that agents were never warned that Crooks was on the roof with a rifle.
Meanwhile, newly released footage from the shooting scene, which shows local police officers surrounding the building where the gunman fired shots for more than two minutes before the attack, supports this puzzling question.
While local police were in charge of the scene where Crooks opened fire, the Secret Service was ultimately responsible for coordinating security on the day.
