When a deranged would-be assassin managed to avoid many levels of local police and Secret Service protection in order to fire a hail of bullets at the Republican nominee, former President Donald Trump was just millimeters away from having his head blasted off.
Due to the fact that one of the eight rounds skimmed the top of Trump's right ear, he was forced to duck down and then drop to the floor of the stage, where he was swiftly covered by a phalanx of Secret Service personnel.
With his blood-streaked face, the aggressive candidate stood up boldly as he was being led offstage. He then proceeded to pump his fist and yell "Fight!" to the startled gathering of fans. However, a few moments later, he appeared scared as he was being immediately transported to a waiting vehicle.
“It’s not in Trump’s nature to think about such things, but even he has to be shaking his head over how close he came to death. A fraction of an inch in either direction and the bullet goes into his head rather than his ear. He’s lucky to be alive,” a Beltway source told The National Enquirer.
The lone shooter who carried out the attack on July 13 at a campaign rally held at a fairgrounds in Butler, Pennsylvania, was identified by the police as Thomas Matthew Crooks, who was 20 years old.
According to reports, he made a purchase of fifty rounds for his father's military-style rifle just a few hours before the shooting that resulted in the death of a courageous volunteer from the fire department and the serious injury of two others. Snipers from the Secret Service were able to eliminate Crooks shortly after he had fired his bullets.
Crooks, who had only recently graduated from Bethel Park High School, was rumored to have been "relentlessly bullied" and given the nickname "school shooter" because of his peculiar and withdrawn conduct.
By some strange twist of fate, the outcast was eliminated from the school's rifle squad due to his poor shooting ability. In later years, he worked as a dietary assistant at a nursing home and resided with his parents in a suburban community that was of middle-class status. The location of Trump's rally was approximately an hour's drive away. The family allegedly had MAGA paraphernalia on their property up until very recently, according to a neighbor.
Thomas, Crooks' father, is a registered Libertarian who was featured by Trump's team in 2016 as a possible supporter due to his pro-gun beliefs.
The perpetrator of the shooting was also a registered Republican, but on the same day that President Joe Biden was sworn into office, he had given fifteen dollars to a political action group that supported liberal causes, as per Reuters. His output on social media was extremely limited.
“The guy’s a ghost who kept to himself. It’s likely we’ll never know for sure what drove this young man to try to commit a historic murder,” the anonymous insider said to the entertainment news outlet.
Beverly Hills shrink Dr. Carole Lieberman believes the bullying Crooks suffered in school “left traumatic scars” on his psyche. “What better way to get revenge on those who laughed at him and rejected him from the school shooting club than to hit the top target in the world from a challenging distance,” she stated.
Despite the fact that the Secret Service had received intelligence suggesting that Iran was planning to kill President Trump, they had already increased their level of protection in recent weeks. Despite the fact that there is no evidence to imply that Crooks was involved in that plot, many remain of the opinion that the Secret Service made a mistake by permitting him to reach a factory rooftop that was only 130 yards away from where Trump was delivering his speech.
In point of fact, the agents noticed Crooks three hours before the attempt to kill him because he was carrying a scope that hunters use for long-range shootings, which was a suspicious sight. According to reports, Crooks was observed by police snipers at least three times before he climbed to the rooftop. Two hours and twenty-six minutes before Trump was shot, a law enforcement officer took a picture of him lying on the roof and reported it.
There were a great number of individuals in the crowd that witnessed Crooks sitting on the rooftop. They reported the matter to the Secret Service as well as the local police, but their warnings appear to have been ignored.
According to Jason Chaffetz, a former chair of the House Oversight Committee who has investigated shortcomings of the Secret Service in the past, officers become exhausted during campaigns and were "spread too thin" to guard high-profile targets such as Donald Trump.
The Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, who is in charge of the Secret Service, has admitted that a direct line of sight such as that to the former president should not take place.
In the aftermath of the attempted assassination, it became clear that the Secret Service had delegated significant aspects of its protection strategy to local law enforcement. One of these important aspects was the obligation to ensure that no one got access to rooftops in the vicinity of the fairgrounds.
“How the f**k did he get a gun that close,” one former Secret Service officer snarls in a text exchange with colleagues, and the finger-pointing has already started.
Local authorities, who, according to the opinions of some specialists, were not qualified for the duty, were blamed by a number of Secret Service operatives. “There’s a lot of people covering their butts right now. No one wants to take responsibility,’ the informant said.
