Secret Service under fire again after another gunman targets Trump
For the second time in more than two months, the Secret Service, which protects the highest echelons of American leadership, is under close surveillance. This time, it came after a gunman spent 12 hours hiding in the bushes along the fence of former President Donald Trump’s golf course.
The man was not shot, but critics question how he could have been just a few hundred feet away from Trump — especially after security was beefed up for the Republican presidential candidate following his near-death experience in July.
Biden administration officials praised the agency’s response, and former Secret Service agents say there are stark differences between what happened Sunday and the security lapses at an outdoor rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when a gunman climbed onto an unsecured roof nearby and opened fire, hitting Trump in the ear and leaving a spectator dead.
Authorities say Ryan Wesley Routh was camping with food and a gun just outside the 27-hole Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach, Florida, where the former president was playing Sunday. A Secret Service agent working for Trump saw the barrel of the gun poking through the fence and opened fire. Routh fled and was later arrested.
Law enforcement has long known that locations along the perimeter of the property make Trump visible to those behind the fence, and some have questioned why it wasn’t protected. But a sprawling golf course presents its own challenges, especially for a last-minute round, even with Trump’s beefed-up security, former Secret Service agents say.
A 1,000-acre golf course with miles of fencing is breachable. And the systems put in place to contain those threats worked. That’s not to say they couldn’t do more. But there are limits to what’s possible, said Paul Eckloff, a retired Secret Service agent who served in the department’s protective services for three presidents during his 23-year career.
The Secret Service is scrambling to protect a growing number of high-profile individuals, from presidents to visiting dignitaries, in a vitriolic political climate. President Joe Biden and some Republicans are pushing for more resources for the agency, which still faces multiple investigations and whose director resigned after the first attempt on Trump’s life.
Acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe Jr. said Sunday’s golf match was not on a formal schedule or announced in advance. That means agents could find out about it a day or even minutes beforehand.
Rowe stressed that the shooter never had a line of sight of the former president and that security worked as it should. He said the perimeter of the compound was not secured in advance because Trump should not have been there in the first place. Rowe described how officers spread out in front of and behind Trump, looking for threats.
Trump and his campaign have frequently praised the agents who protect him, but they have also raised broader concerns about the agency, including that it is undersized given the threat level.
But some have raised questions. During an interview Monday on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show, Trump’s son Eric questioned how the shooter was able to remain at the location for so long without being detected.
Those officers on the ground, they are remarkable, he said. But there is a breakdown.
Rowe said a day earlier: The officer’s hypervigilance and the police’s quick actions were textbook examples.
It’s not possible for the Secret Service to shut down all traffic around the golf course, said Eckloff, who protected Trump during his presidency, including at two of his Florida courses. The course is in the middle of the city, and such a move would have huge implications for residents.
Trump enjoys golf and owns three courses in Florida. Trump International is the closest to his home at Mar-a-Lago and is a place he likes to hang out with friends. When Trump was president, news photographers were often able to get photos of him on the green by finding holes in the brush.
Security around Trump was dramatically tightened after the July shooting. Trump now speaks from behind bulletproof glass at outdoor rallies, and long guns are often seen near the places he stays.
The agency is not releasing specifics about his protection, but Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said Trump’s detail now includes countersurveillance, a countersniper and counterassault assets. Before the Pennsylvania shooting, some of those assets were used, depending on the event, but now they are a permanent part of his detail, Guglielmi said.
At a POLITICO event on Tuesday, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas praised Sunday’s response, saying Trump’s security is now pretty much on par with Biden’s. Many Republicans doubt that’s true.
Anthony Cangelosi, a former Secret Service agent who now teaches at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said the critical moment highlights the need for more personnel to protect Trump and that those individuals may have been deployed to secure the area surrounding the trail.
That visible presence is intended to prevent actors from saying, ‘Oh, I can do this today,'” Cangelosi said.
He praised the officer who spotted the barrel, but said there was always a chance they missed it.
The Palm Beach County sheriff said the entire golf course would be filled with law enforcement if Trump were president, but because he isn’t, security is limited to areas the Secret Service deems possible.
After the second apparent assassination attempt, Biden said the Secret Service needs more resources and called on Congress to help. Rowe said the agency had immediate needs and that he was talking to Congress about funding.
Some lawmakers have said they are willing to consider it. Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham says money alone won’t solve the problems, but he’s heard from Secret Service agents that the hours are terrible. You’ll never convince me that more people won’t help.
Sen. Susan Collins, the top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, said lawmakers need more details, especially since the Secret Service has said a lack of resources was not the reason for the security lapses that led to the first attempt.
Even if new money is approved soon, it could take up to 18 months to hire a new Secret Service employee, said retired Secret Service supervisory agent Bobby McDonald. The agency may want to shift more personnel from investigative work to the protective side, he said.
There is no quick fix, said McDonald, now a criminal justice professor at the University of New Haven. He noted that hiring people from outside the agency temporarily to help can come with its own challenges, since they don’t regularly do protective work.
Rowe stressed Monday that it was not just about more overtime for staff, which he said was “redlining.”
Former officers also wonder where the staff would come from. With all the political venom and direct blame, Eckloff said he worries about the effect of such hostility from those whose job it is to step in front of a bullet.
They are worthy of trust and assurance, but they need help. Constructive criticism is absolutely necessary, he said. But simply demanding resignations or saying they are failing does not make anyone safer or enhance national security.
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