The July 13 rally marks the first time the Secret Service's counter-sniper team has deployed to a Trump event

An admission by the US Secret Service about former President Donald Trump's protective detail bolstered the GOP leader's view of divine intervention.

“For all non-believers…”

(Video: US Secret Service)

While the agency tasked with securing the leader of the free world and other high-profile figures have yet to provide an explanation for how a would-be assassin came within inches of killing Trump, they did manage to raise concerns that a decision maker may have been playing fast and loose in terms of protecting the Republican nominee.

During a lengthy press conference on Friday, acting US Secret Service Director Ronald Rowe revealed that, prior to the July 13 demonstration in Butler, Pennsylvania, no snipers from the agency had been used as part of his post-White House protection.

“It was the first time that Secret Service snipers were deployed to support the former president's detail,” he told the media. “Regarding why they were at Butler, listen, we assess our threat landscape every day, we calibrate based on that threat, we assessed a threat stream that we have and we put our Secret Service counter-snipers on staff.”

“And looking back, it was very fortunate that we did,” Rowe said, as one of the counter-snipers was credited with neutralizing the threat. “But the former president [and his running mate Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance] will have cover against advancing snipers.”

Speaking at a rally in Atlanta, Georgia, on Saturday, Trump continued to praise the specific officers who rushed to protect him when the shooting began and credited God for keeping him alive and relatively unharmed. read

“The Secret Services were very brave. They were very brave, I can say”, said the Republican leader. “They were very brave. They were running towards me and they knew that the bullets were going right over my head at that moment. The first was not a good situation; It's not a good situation.”

“That was really an incredible thing. That was from God. That was from God,” Trump continued before adding, “For all the non-believers, that was for God, right?”

'This was from God': President Trump on surviving assassination attempt during Atlanta speech pic.twitter.com/QL6qvSMpFP

— RSBN (@RSBNetwork) August 3, 2024

The New York Post indicated that prior to the July 13 rally, Trump's details “had been covered by state and local sniper teams, which for the Butler Farm show venue had been staffed by Emergency Services Unit personnel from Beaver County.”

Since the attempt on his life, the president has made it clear that if he had not turned his head when he did during the rally that ended in tragedy, the injuries would likely have been fatal. As such, earlier in the week he had invited the woman responsible for displaying a graphic on the monitor above the stage to publicly thank her. He had turned to look at the screen before the bullet hit his ear.

According to Rowe, at the same time shots were being fired, a member of Trump's security detail was on the phone with the USSS Pittsburgh field office trying to find out more information about the suspect who reports revealed that the forces of the order had been aware of more than an hour and a half before the start of the president's speech.

“Hey, what do you know about this?” the acting director said he was asked. “In the middle of this phone conversation, shots started being fired.”

Meanwhile, as only now USSS Director Kimberly Cheatle had resigned amid mounting pressure, an agency reporting had come forward demanding that his supervisors be let go as he warned: “We should all expect another assassination attempt before November. We have exposed our inability to protect our leaders because of our leadership “.

Staff writer

A native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College, where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and seeker of truth, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and dog, and when he's not researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel ·the.

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