If Donald Trump loses in November, will a January 6 2.0 exist? Co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin, who previously worked under Trump, cautioned on Wednesday, October 15, in the episode "The View" that the former president, 78, would not be defeated in November without a fight.
Joy Behar, 82, initiated the conversation by stating, "We all saw it with our own eyes, even Mike Pence, who needs to come out stronger now, I think," about the January 6, 2021, insurrection on the Capitol.
"His life was on the line. They had a noose ready for him. How do these people that are still following him, follow him? I don't understand the mentality anymore," she exclaimed.
There "has been a total rewriting and white-washing" of the horrific incident, according to the conservative, who has subsequently condemned Trump.
"They completely changed their tune when Donald Trump showed that he's still got some power and still got some support because it was politically advantageous to them," she elaborated on the numerous Republican politicians who have maintained their support for Trump despite his ongoing assertion that the 2020 election was hijacked from him.
Behar intervened, characterizing those legislators as "pathetic."
"If he loses, do you guys honestly think this time he'll take it like a man and just concede and move on? He's going to try to steal the election, and the Biden administration needs to be ready to secure the Capitol and state capitals," Griffin questioned her co-hosts.
Whoopi Goldberg subsequently claimed that Trump would "try to start some poo" if his opponent Kamala Harris won in November.
Sunny Hostin subsequently discussed her predictions for the aftermath of the American election.
"I'm very worried about the fact that I do believe that Kamala Harris will win the popular vote and also win the election, and I think he'll deny if she wins, and I think we need to be really, really vigilant the weeks after November 5, after the election," the legal representative stated.
Alyssa Farah Griffin concluded by emphasizing that Harris would not exhibit the same reaction they had anticipated for Trump.
"By the way, if he wins, Kamala Harris will concede, and she will likely show up to his inauguration because that's what we do in America. We allow the peaceful transition of power," she declared.
Griffin further criticized Trump on a recent episode of "The View" after he referred to Goldberg as "filthy dirty" during one of his rallies due to her negative comments about him on the show, as OK! Magazine previously reported.
"He’s always been triggered by women when they call him out," she stated about Trump's consistent outbursts.
Goldberg responded, “This is what irritated him, not what's going on. Hurricanes, all kinds of stuff going on in our country, but we irritated him to the point where he had to admit he does watch the show, something we all knew. So when you hear people say, 'I don't watch that show,' they're lying!" she stated, alluding to Hurricane Milton, which recently struck Florida.
Meanwhile, an independent panel investigating the shortcomings that resulted in the attempted assassination of former President Trump in July urged the Secret Service to replace its leadership with individuals from the private sector and concentrate only on its protection role, The New York Times reported.
The recommendations, part of a report released Thursday commissioned by the Department of Homeland Security, outlined deficiencies that have already been identified in the months after the rally in Butler, Pa., on July 13. This encompasses the Secret Service's inability to secure a proximate structure from which a rooftop assailant discharged eight rounds at Mr. Trump. Panel participants indicated that such security vulnerabilities stem from a "critical thinking" deficiency among agents and managers.
The panel was particularly impressed by a “lack of ownership” communicated by the agents it met. Those involved in the security planning did not take responsibility in the lead-up to the event, nor did they own failures in the aftermath. The assessment indicated that they had engaged minimally in self-reflection regarding identifying blunders, omissions, or possibilities for enhancement.
The findings are stark but familiar. A panel assembled 2014 following an incident in which an individual breached the White House perimeter and gained access to the residence made analogous recommendations. A decade later, the persistence of the challenges highlights the difficulty of reforming an organization with a deeply ingrained culture.
“The service has become insular and stale,” Janet Napolitano, a member of the four-person group, said in an interview. Ms. Napolitano served as the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, the parent agency of the Secret Service, from 2009 to 2013. “It is time for the service to expand and engage beyond its own agency to attract talent that can provide a novel perspective on its operations and methodologies.” In the past century, the agency has had only one director who was not promoted from within.
The panel comprised Frances Fragos Townsend, a former homeland security adviser under the George W. Bush administration; David Mitchell, a law enforcement veteran with over 50 years of experience; and Mark Filip, a former deputy attorney general under the Bush administration. They executed 58 interviews and examined almost 7,000 papers.
The report stated, "The Secret Service must be the preeminent governmental protective agency globally." The occurrences at Butler on July 13 illustrate that, at present, it is not.
Should the service adopt the panel’s recommendation that it shift its focus almost entirely to protection operations, that would mean shedding much of its historic role in investigating financial crimes.
A Secret Service spokeswoman did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
The agency has made significant changes since July 13, including assigning additional personnel and assets to Trump’s detail and ensuring the security planning process for events is more thorough. On September 15, Mr. Trump was once again targeted when an individual armed with a rifle concealed himself near the location where Mr. Trump was golfing in Florida.
The independent review is among numerous inquiries initiated following the assassination attempt on July 13. Lawmakers are conducting their inquiries, and the Secret Service did an internal review. Among the key failures identified were the absence of a single Secret Service agent in charge of the security for the Butler rally, the complacency of some agents involved in securing the rally, and the lack of clear instructions from the Secret Service to local officials helping them.
However, the independent review panel's candid evaluation is the inaugural identification of shortcomings by top agents assigned to Trump's details.
The panel identified occasions when the site agent responsible for coordinating security at the Butler Farm Show grounds inadequately ensured that essential security measures were implemented before the rally, partially due to her lack of expertise. She completed her education at the agency's academy in 2020 and became a member of Mr. Trump's detail in 2023.
The panel stated that the decision to assign her this task seemed to rely on her availability, lacking sufficient evaluation by supervisory staff concerning the agent's experience, aptitude, and training, or the absence thereof, for participating in planning a significant outdoor rally event such as Butler.
The panel also observed the inexperience of another agent on Trump’s detail who was tasked with operating a drone detection system on the day of the rally. The agent, who commenced work four years prior, had undergone only informal training regarding system operation, and July 13 was merely the third occasion he utilized it at an event.
On the day of the rally, he faced significant technical challenges that he spent hours resolving. Consequently, the equipment was nonfunctional when the assailant, Thomas Crooks, piloted a drone over the rally location that afternoon.
The panel stated, “Both examples illustrate the possible influence of inexperience among Trump’s detail personnel on various elements of the planning and execution of the July 13 rally.”
The site agent from Trump’s detail is one of six agents to be placed on restricted duty since the July assassination attempt. The remaining five originate from the service's Pittsburgh field office. Kimberly A. Cheatle, the agency's director at the time, has resigned.
The unequal assignment of guilt has led to significant splits inside the agency, raising concerns regarding the lack of scrutiny faced by specific members of Mr. Trump’s detail compared to agents in the Pittsburgh office.
The panel's suggestions encompass concrete alterations, including aerial monitoring at all outdoor events and institutional transformations, such as emphasizing ongoing training and creating a leadership training program.
The panel members also singled out a failure at Butler that has been somewhat overlooked in other reviews to date: the troubling way the agents surrounding Mr. Trump allowed the upper half of his body to be exposed at a time when no one knew whether other shooters remained. The panel recommended agents undergo further training on properly removing someone they protect from danger.
While much of the focus since the failed assassination has been on the agency’s stretched resources during an intense campaign season, the panel cautioned against expecting more funding to solve its problems.
“If the remediation and reform dialogue around the failures of July 13 devolves into a discussion about how much additional money the service should receive, critical lessons from July 13 will have been lost,” the report said.
Business Times has reached out to Donald Trump for comments.
