WASHINGTON– An independent panel investigating the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania has blamed the Secret Service for poor communications that day and failing to secure the building where the shooter fired. The review also revealed more systemic problems within the agency, such as a failure to understand the unique risks Trump faces and a culture of “doing more with less.”

The 52-page report released Thursday took the Secret Service to task for specific issues leading up to the July 13 rally in Butler as well as a deeper problem with the agency’s culture. He recommends calling on new external leaders and refocusing on its protection mission.

“The Secret Service as an agency needs fundamental reform to carry out its mission,” wrote the authors, Alejandro Mayorkas, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, the Secret Service’s parent agency, in a letter accompanying their report. “Without this reform, the independent review panel believes that another butler can and will happen again.”

One rally attendee was killed and two others injured when Thomas Michael Crooks climbed onto the roof of a nearby building and opened fire while Trump spoke. The former president suffered an ear injury before being removed from the scene by Secret Service agents. That shooting, along with another incident in Florida while Trump was playing golf — a shooter there never managed to move toward the president or fire a shot — led to a crisis of confidence in the agency.

The report by a panel of four former national and state law enforcement officials follows investigations by members of Congress, the agency’s own investigators and the watchdog of internal security.

An overview of the report’s key findings and recommendations:

The panel echoed previous reports that focused on the failure to secure the building near the rally that had a clear line to where Trump was speaking and the multiple communications issues that hampered the capacity of secret services and local and state law enforcement. to talk to each other.

“The failure to secure a building complex, parts of which were approximately 130 meters from the protected person and containing numerous positions presenting a high-angle line-of-sight risk, represents a critical security failure,” it said. the report.

The panel criticized planning between the Secret Service and local law enforcement, and said the Secret Service failed to ask questions about what was being done to secure the building: “Relying on an understanding The general assumption that ‘the locals cover this area’ is simply not good enough and, in fact, at Butler this attitude contributed to the security failure.

The panel also cited the fact that there were two separate command posts at Butler’s rally: one with various local law enforcement agencies and another with the Secret Service: “This created, at the highest level, a structural division in the flow of communications. »

There were other communication problems.

The Secret Service had to change radio channels because radio traffic from agents protecting first lady Jill Biden at an event in Pittsburgh was appearing on the channels of agents covering the Butler rally.

The panel also noted that all law enforcement personnel in the field used a “chaotic mix” of radio, cellphone, texting and email throughout the day to communicate.

The panel also said it was unclear who had ultimate command that day.

The report looked into the agency’s culture and painted a picture of an agency that struggles to think critically about how it accomplishes its mission, particularly when it comes to protecting Trump.

The panel said agency staff acted under the assumption that they effectively had to “do more with less.” The report says the additional security measures taken to protect Trump after the Butler shooting should have been taken beforehand.

“To be clear, the panel did not identify any nefarious or malicious intent behind this phenomenon, but rather an over-reliance on assigning staff based on categories (alumni, candidate, candidate) instead of an individualized assessment of risks,” the panel wrote.

The panel also noted the “back and forth” between Trump’s security detail and Secret Service headquarters regarding the number of people needed to protect him.

The panel also faulted some senior executives involved in the rally for what they called a “lack of ownership.” In one example, the panel said a lead on-site officer responsible for coordinating communications failed to walk the rally site in advance and notify his state police counterpart before bringing together how communications would be managed.

He cited the relative inexperience of two specific officers who played a role in securing the July 13 rally. One of them was Trump’s site agent whose job it was to coordinate with the Pittsburgh field office on security planning for the rally. The panel said the agent graduated from the Secret Service academy in 2020 and has only been on Trump’s team since 2023. Before Butler’s rally, the agent had only performed ” minimal prior site work or site security planning.

Another agent tasked with operating a drone detection system had only used the technology in two previous events.

Have a unified command post at all major events where Secret Service and other law enforcement officials are all physically in the same location; aerial surveillance for all external events; safety plans must include a way to mitigate line of site issues up to 1,000 meters and who is responsible for the event; and more training on how to get protected people out of dangerous scenarios.

The panel said the agency also needs new external leadership and a renewed focus on its core protection mission, while expressing skepticism about continuing the investigations it currently conducts. While the Secret Service is well known for protecting presidents and other dignitaries, it also investigates financial crimes.

“In the Panel’s view, it is simply unacceptable for the Service to focus less than on its protection mission, particularly when this protection mission function is currently suboptimal,” the report states.

Panel members were Mark Filip, assistant attorney general under President George W. Bush; David Mitchell, who has served in numerous state and local law enforcement positions in Maryland and Delaware; Janet Napolitano, secretary of Homeland Security under President Barack Obama; and Frances Fragos Townsend, Bush’s homeland security and counterterrorism aide.