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Questions swirl around security measures at Trump rally
There are serious questions about security at the rally held by Donald Trump. FOX 5’s David Kaplan spoke with an expert who says the questions are warranted: How was the shooter able to get so close and fire rounds toward the former president?
WASHINGTON - Questions continue mounting over how the deadly shooting at former President Donald Trump's Pennsylvania rally could have happened.
President Joe Biden is calling for an independent investigation into the Secret Service security plan for former President Donald Trump’s rally and on Capitol Hill, the House Oversight Committee also says they have questions.
A security expert who spoke with FOX 5 said he was completely shocked to hear that this happened.
Art Roderick has 40 years of law enforcement experience, including 25 as a US Marshall and working with Homeland Security.
Roderick says the fact that the suspect was able to climb onto the roof of a building just 150 yards away from the former President Trump and have a clear shot cannot happen and he wondered if there was *enough* security at the rally.
He says open-air events are the toughest to protect, security has to worry about the event itself and the perimeter around it.
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"There should have been more distance," Roderick said. "A lot longer of a distance than just 150 yards, 130-150 yards clearance. I saw a complete lack of aerial surveillance, either drone or helicopter."
Kyle Klein, who was a House Homeland Security Committee staffer for a decade. He says the multiple inquiries into how this could happen could take months if not years.
"It’s obviously a massive, historic event that’s occurred, so you’re going to have multiple investigations across different committees of jurisdiction across the House and the Senate," Klein aid.
He’s hopeful the number of investigations by various legislative committees and within the executive branch will help prevent further political violence like what we saw yesterday.
"It’s going to be a long road to see exactly what happened and do as thorough a job as needs to, but I’m confident that people will get to the bottom of it, and I think that’s the benefit of having a multi-pronged investigation is that people look at it from different angles and you come out with different conclusions that will ultimately, hopefully, prevent anything like this from happening in the future," said Klein.
He added that he’s hopeful these will be sober, apolitical investigations and that the overall temperature surrounding our politics cools.