The Task Force on The Attempted Assassination of Donald Trump didn’t get the federal cooperation and answers it was looking for through its five-month investigation, but it did uncover key security failures in communication and preparation by the U.S. Secret Service.

“With that day, there’s nobody that can bring it together for us,” said U.S. Rep. Mike Kelly, R-16th, the Butler native who led the bipartisan task force. “We never got the answers that we were looking for.”

The U.S. House of Representatives voted unanimously on July 24 to create the task force with subpoena power, as introduced by Kelly, to understand what went wrong, ensure accountability and prevent future failures. It issued its final 180-page report in December. The group found several errors in planning and execution and made recommendations to Congress addressing them.

Despite the subpoena power, the task force was only given access to 81 descriptions of interviews out of more than 1,000 the Federal Bureau of Investigation conducted. Kelly said unanswered information requests to federal agencies plagued the investigation.

“I think the American people really deserve to have an answer of what happened that day,” Kelly said. “If not, people are losing faith and trust in their government.”

The task force found key errors as far back as assigned personnel and site selection.

In addition to only four Donald Trump Division agents, the Secret Service assigned about five agents from its Pittsburgh office and 11 agents from other field offices for a total of 20 assigned to the rally, the task force found, with an expected turnout of 15,000 to 20,000 attendees.

The rest of the federal agents on the ground during the assassination attempt were from Homeland Security, but Kelly said the task force did not find their assigned roles or how many were at the rally.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives assisted in subsequent investigations.

Multiple news outlets reported Wednesday, July 9, that six Secret Service agents at the assassination attempt were suspended for their performance. The individual agents were not named.

Last year, Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle resigned 10 days after the attempt.

“I applaud Director (Sean) Curran and Deputy Director (Matthew) Quinn’s efforts to implement transparency and accountability to the Secret Service,” Kelly said. “It is critical that we remain dedicated to returning the Secret Service to the gold standard of protection as they modernize their zero-fail mission. I look forward to working with Director Curran to restore the Secret Service as the elite law enforcement agency in the country.”

Kelly said acting Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe was ashamed and apologetic in a Dec. 5 hearing when discussing the events and death of Corey Comperatore, a former Buffalo Township fire chief who was killed when eight gunshots were fired into the crowd at the July 13 rally.

“The president survived an assassination attempt. Corey Comperatore didn’t,” Kelly said.

The attempt also sparked concern about how the Secret Service performs under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Kelly said in a June 18 interview he plans to announce legislation to bring the Secret Service out from Homeland Security and place it back under the U.S. Department of the Treasury.

Kelly has not yet officially announced the legislation since discussing it in a June 18 interview with the Butler Eagle.

“They need to be more of an elite group,” Kelly said.

Kelly said local and state law enforcement did their jobs and properly communicated with each other about would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks before and after he climbed the American Glass Research building, but they couldn’t overcome the federal agencies’ communication failures.

Butler Township police said they could not comment on the July 13 assassination attempt because of the potential for future litigation. David Dutch and James Copenhaver, the two rally attendees who were critically injured during the shooting, have said they plan to file lawsuits against Butler County and some relevant agencies.

Kelly isn’t surprised about the conspiracy theories and lawsuits. To him, the Butler Farm Show site in itself was a security risk.

The farm show grounds in Connoquenessing Township were selected as the rally site July 3 without a previous site inspection, Kelly said. He said such an inspection may have brought attention to the unsecured American Glass Research facility.

Six days before the rally on July 8, Secret Service agents conducted site walkthroughs with farm show staff and discussed aspects like stage location and the line of site from outside the venue, according to the task force.

In a July 9 meeting, special agents discussed the AGR property with Butler County Emergency Services and Pennsylvania State Police representatives. The group left the meeting with the consensus that the property would be closed, secured and monitored by roving law enforcement, according to the task force.

Secret Service agents in a July 10 meeting confirmed the property would be closed with a patrol vehicle blocking the parking lot and police stationed inside the double-fences between the properties.

The task force found the Secret Service assigned four roving protective intelligence teams, which monitor for suspicious attendees, under one agent to monitor the more than 100-acre property with seven entrances.

The Secret Service employs full-time protective intelligence advance agents, but the task force found the agent assigned July 13 was appointed from the Pittsburgh field office and not a full-time protective intelligence agent. The agent testified he had limited experience in the role and no formal training for it since the academy.

Secret Service agents also requested additional agents on July 10, 2024, including 22 post standers to be stationed at various checkpoints, six Secret Service special agents and 16 Homeland Security Investigations special agents. Three additional post standers were also recommended but not requested.

However, one Secret Service special agent testified the Homeland Security Investigations special agents are more challenging to work with than Secret Service agents and require more explanation of their duties due to different training. The majority of post standers that day were Homeland Security Investigations special agents.

On July 12, one Butler County sheriff’s deputy and one state trooper were the only planned patrols in the area between the Butler Farm Show and AGR grounds. State police said later they were never instructed to assign a patrol vehicle between the properties.

Secret Service agents also discussed with campaign staff potentially using large farm equipment to block sight lines, but it was declined because the equipment was too large, according to the task force.

While the chosen rally site and personnel weren’t set up for success, failures throughout the day further impeded law enforcement, the task force found.

“Nearly every Secret Service and (local law enforcement) officer present on July 13 testified to the Task Force that communications on site cold have been better,” the task force wrote.

The task force found several local law enforcement officers and Secret Service agents experienced connection issues with their company and personal cellphones, which were used as backups for radios in some cases.

Some Secret Service and state police radios were also malfunctioning, including those picking up communications from former first lady Jill Biden’s event in Pittsburgh the same day.

Biden had no Homeland Security Investigations special agents assigned to her protection and fewer Secret Service agents, according to the task force.

The communication issues also affected the two separate local law enforcement and Secret Service command posts. The task force found the Secret Service utilizes a security room at all events to relay and coordinate information.

A Secret Service senior special agent testified to the task force local and state law enforcement were invited to the security room in a July 8 meeting, but a state police lieutenant and Butler County Emergency Services representative at the meeting testified they did not hear an agent say local law enforcement were invited into the security room.

Butler County Emergency Services provided a command post trailer for local law enforcement use. State police did not have representation in the local command post because they thought it would be used by medical personnel and to block the line of sight from outside to the stage, according to the task force.

Secret Service stationed in the security room did not know the local command post existed. An agent testified to the task force “(at) some point during the day, it became apparent that the state police representative who was in the command post with me was talking on the phone with people somewhere else.”

State police did put a radio in the local command center, which local law enforcement discovered to be malfunctioning. A Butler Emergency Services Unit commander would instead relay information with cellphones, which are slower than a radio, to a state police sergeant stationed in the Secret Service command center.

The Secret Service also experienced malfunctions with its counter-unmanned aerial detection system during the morning and early afternoon.

The detection system was to monitor the airspace over the rally for potential threats and would automatically send text messages to designated agents if a threat were detected. The agent operating the system informed some, but not all, key personnel the system was down, the task force found.

Crooks flew a drone about 200 yards from Butler Farm Show grounds around 3:51 p.m. for 11 minutes. The detection system started working at 4:33 p.m. on July 13, according to the task force.

Kelly said local law enforcement on the ground identified Crooks as a suspicious person around 5 p.m., more than an hour before shooting began. He was seen through binoculars and range finders by multiple Butler County Emergency Services Unit officers and a Beaver County sniper.

“All of a sudden, the concentration is on one person for an hour and a half before it takes place,” Kelly said.

Local officers knew of Crooks about 38 minutes before the Secret Service. Local officers had been communicating his whereabouts over their radios and began looking for him around 5:46 p.m., the task force said in its report.

Secret Service in the security room were made aware local law enforcement were looking for Crooks around 5:50 p.m.

The task force found only about nine Secret Service agents of the 20 present knew of Crooks’ presence when the first shots were fired, and none close to Trump were informed.

The Secret Service countersniper team also did not pick up a local radio left for them, which would have allowed them to communicate with the local sniper team. The task force said in its report local sniper teams “understood” they were to focus on the crowd and venue itself, and Secret Service countersnipers would monitor the surrounding area.

However, the Secret Service countersnipers viewed the AGR property as the local sniper teams’ responsibility, the task force discovered in its interviews with law enforcement.

Secret Service policy states the countersniper teams should have directed local snipers, according to the task force.

“The question is,” Kelly said, “so why did you allow Trump to come out of the tent to start his address if you were unsure that the area was safe and secure?”

Kelly said his question was never answered.

An autopsy uncovered Crooks was killed by a single bullet. The autopsy was performed by the Allegheny County medical examiner after Butler County Coroner William Young III transported the body to Pittsburgh.

The task force found the autopsy was conducted at 9:15 a.m. July 15, and the body was released to the funeral home July 22 and cremated.

Kelly said it was highly unusual for Crooks’ body to be released before the case was closed. He sympathized with Crooks’ family but also questioned who authorized his remains to be released.

He said the security failures of July 13 became even more obvious at the Oct. 5 rally.

“The difference between that site on Oct. 5 versus July 13 is the difference between day and night,” Kelly said. “Everything had changed.”

The task force found a robust plan to mitigate line-of-site concerns when it reviewed paperwork for the Oct. 5 rally.

The Secret Service also did not request an additional counter-surveillance unit typical for high-profile events for the July 13 rally because they assumed it would be denied due to Trump’s status as a former president, the task force found.

“I’m a huge advocate of (the counter-surveillance unit) and was surprised when I was told that’s not an asset requested,” said one senior special agent whose name was redacted from the task force report.

The task force found the counter-surveillance unit request for Oct. 5 generated a significant amount of paperwork addressing risks outside the site.

Kelly said the previous line-of-site issues were largely fixed by law enforcement and civilians for the Oct. 5 rally. He recounted seeing trailers parked end-to-end, which had to be driven in and placed that morning, and large metal freight containers inside the venue blocking sight outside.

But line-of-sight issues couldn’t be mitigated at Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, Fla., where on Sept. 15 another assassination attempt was made on Trump. The attempt was also investigated by the task force.

Just like Crooks, Kelly was concerned about the lack of information surrounding would-be assassin Ryan Routh.

Kelly said Crooks appeared to be a loner who liked guns. He told his parents he’d be going to the shooting range July 13, and his father called the police when Crooks didn’t return.

Kelly said Routh was just as mysterious. The Hawaii resident traveled to Florida knowing where Trump would be and carried guns with unreadable serial numbers, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

Routh is awaiting trial in Florida regarding the assassination attempt and is seeking to fire his court-appointed federal public defenders, according to the Associated Press.

The task force found Secret Service agents fired at Routh as soon as they saw his gun poking through the chain-link fence at the golf course instead of waiting for permission, which they did at the July 13 rally. Routh escaped in a positioned getaway vehicle, but not before a picture was taken of his license plate.

The task force made a list of 37 recommendations to Congress ranging from agents and their training to equipment failure protocols and interagency cooperation.

Kelly said the recommended changes will take time and more cooperation in Congress to implement, but he believes they’re possible. The agencies involved also all fall under the executive branch, meaning their appointed leadership changes with each administration.

“I am disappointed we didn’t have more interaction with the federal agencies,” Kelly said.

The task force report lists almost four pages of unanswered information requests to the Secret Service, Homeland Security, the FBI, ATF and Department of Justice. It listed some outstanding requests from state police as well but said the agency provided “significant cooperation.”

“We did as much as we could do with the assets we were given and the availability to talk to people,” Kelly said.

Kelly said the lack of responses from federal agencies made it hard for the task force to ask follow-up questions. Federal agencies were also conducting their own internal investigations and did not share information.

The task force also came together at an inopportune time, Kelly said. After forming in July, members of Congress were out of Washington, D.C., during August, which Kelly said is typical in an election year.

Many task force members were also running for reelection and were in their home states more than Washington, Kelly said. During that time, their campaign staffs would work on the investigation and corroborating information between law enforcement groups.

Members returned in late September for a couple weeks before the Nov. 5 election. Kelly said the task force is still active, even after the final report was released.

“We never felt that we got the answers we needed to,” Kelly said.