Independent panel probing Trump assassination attempt says Secret Service needs 'fundamental reform'

The Secret Service is in need of "fundamental reform," according to reported released Thursday morning by an independent panel investigating the July 13 assassination attempt of former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

In a 52-page report, the panel said the agency failed to properly secure the building from which the gunman fired shots into the rally. One rally attendee was killed and three others were wounded, including Trump, who is now the 2024 GOP presidential nominee. His right ear was grazed by a bullet.

“The failure to secure a complex of buildings, portions of which were within approximately 130 yards of the protectee and containing numerous positions carrying high-angle line of sight risk, represents a critical security failure,” the report states. 

“Relying on a general understanding that ‘the locals have that area covered’ is simply not good enough and, in fact, at Butler this attitude contributed to the security failure."

The report found several communications problems that were caused, in part, by having two separate command posts at rally site for local law enforcement and the Secret Service.

"This created, at the highest level, a structural divide in the flow of communications," reads the report.

In a letter attached to the report, the panel said another incident like Butler could happen again without significant reform within the agency.

“The Secret Service as an agency requires fundamental reform to carry out its mission,” the authors of the report wrote to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. “Without that reform, the Independent Review Panel believes another Butler can and will happen again.”

The panel members include Mark Filip, deputy attorney general under former President George W. Bush; Janet Napolitano, Homeland security secretary under former President Barack Obama; David Mitchell, who has served in state and local law enforcement positions in Maryland and Delaware; and Frances Fragos Townsend, a homeland security to Bush.