Butler County Trump rally attendees still in shock over slack security, poor planning
On July 12, 2024, 16-year-old Sophia Zang walked around the Butler Farm Show grounds with her family to check out the area being prepared for then presidential candidate Donald Trump’s campaign rally.
There, under the evening sky and with the American flag at the backdrop, she would go on to take a photo on the podium in Connoquenessing Township where Trump was supposed to speak.
Little did Sophia know that the podium would soon become the setting of international news — the very spot where Trump got up after a failed attempt at his life, pumped his fist in the air and shouted “Fight.”
Michelle Zang, Sophia’s mother, said that she and her family found it strange that they were able to hang out on the farm show grounds and take pictures at the center stage just one day before the rally.
“The fact that she (Sophia) was even allowed to go stand at that podium less than 24 hours before the president was going to be standing there just goes to show how the security was so lax that night,” Michelle Zang said. “He (the shooter) could have been there the night before.”
What was especially concerning to the family is that the Farm Show grounds, spread across a large amount of space and with many buildings, made it easy to hide.
“You would think the (U.S.) Secret Service has got that covered,” Michelle Zang said. “But you look back and you think, ‘Did they really?’”
The unease did not go away the next day as the family — wife Michelle; husband Jason; daughter Sophia; and son Wyatt — got in line for the rally. From the moment in line all the way to the gates, Jason Zang said he noticed that security was minimal, especially compared to other rallies he had attended.
“Security that day just did not seem like they were on the same page for sure,” Michelle Zang said.
Kim Otto, a rally attendee from Harmony, said all the precautions she had previously witnessed at entrance, like security scanning, pat downs and cameras were less than what is typical.
“That day, there were not enough guards there,” Otto said. “There were hardly any.”
While there were metal detectors and some restrictions on what people heading in could bring, Debbie Lightner, an attendee from Sarver, said there were a lot of people with free rein to hang out at the boundary, too close to Trump.
Not only that but leading up to the shooting, Lightner said her mind kept going to the grandstand area, which she thought was too open of a space to be left ignored.
“That whole (grandstand) area there was just open to anybody who could come in to the scene,” Lightner said. “I did not feel that they had secured the outside of the area enough.”
The rally was chaotic and unorganized from the get-go, before the shooting even occurred, spectators said. Attendees were allowed to sit in aisles, where no one is usually allowed to stand, Michelle Zang said. Some in the crowd even had their children sitting up on the fence.
In the sweltering heat of the day that affected more than 200 people, much of the crowd could not even leave the seating area to go get water, Jason Zang said.
It only got worse from here.
The crowd had waited in anticipation from as early as 8 a.m. for Trump to come out and speak. At long last, Trump arrived on the stage at 6:02 p.m., evoking cheers as he greeted the crowd and started talking.
“He (Trump) barely got on his feet, and all hell broke loose,” Angela Cicerchi, an attendee from New Castle, said.
The details of the attempted assassination by Thomas Matthew Crooks, which wounded Trump’s upper right ear, remained murky for a few weeks until an investigation concluded that law enforcement detected Crooks 20 minutes before he took the first shot. None of the countersnipers placed for security measures were tasked with securing the roof of the building Crooks shot from.
Brian McLaughlin, an attendee from Butler, said that he observed the Secret Service looking in the direction of the shooter for about a minute with binoculars before the shot was taken. In fact, when McLaughlin and his friend heard the first shot, they thought the shot was outgoing, and did not get down on the ground right away.
“I’m kind of celebrating because I’m thinking they shot someone trying to attack Trump,” McLaughlin said. “It sounds crazy, but at the time, that’s what we thought.”
McLaughlin, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, said he thinks the Secret Service had sufficient time and clear line of sight on the shooter. McLaughlin said he remains unsatisfied with Secret Service’s explanation on why it failed to prevent the shooting, and that there has not been enough talk about it.
“I haven’t heard any reporting about it, which irritates me,” McLaughlin said. “It was negligence at minimum.”
The next few days for Lightner included looking and waiting for answers about Crooks and how he was able to rain bullets at such an important event.
“I didn’t feel like the investigation was conclusive enough,” Lightner said. “We have a right to assemble free, and I know we cannot be protected from everything, but I’m trying to reach for those answers and I still don’t have those answers.”
When Trump returned to Butler for a second campaign rally on Oct. 5, Sophia Zang decided to join her mother in attending his return. Scared at first, Sophia said there was a considerable increase in security to her relief, including tickets required to go in and out of the seating area.
“I felt so much more safe,” Sophia said. “Everything went amazing, and I’m very glad that I went to that.”
