Newly released footage from the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump shows a shadowy figure running across the roof of the American Glass Research (AGR) building, from which would-be assassin Thomas Matthew Crooks wounded the GOP presidential candidate.
And, in a strange twist, the video came from the smartphone camera of James Copenhaver, one of the two men wounded by Crooks, who also murdered firefighter Corey Comperatore.
The agency has been under fire since July 13, the day Crooks tried to murder Trump. And the new view of the shocking murder attempt won’t help matters. One reason: Former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle — forced to resign after unsatisfactory testimony before a House committee — said the roof was too sloped to safely station members of Trump’s protective detail.
Disappears, Reappears
The video, broadcast by Fox News, was shot from behind and to Trump’s left as he was speaking.
The figure, presumed to be Crooks, runs for about three seconds, then disappears. After another few seconds, just minutes before Crooks fired at Trump and grazed his ear, the figure reappears.
The significance of the video is clear given what former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle told ABC News. The roof’s slope, she claimed, made it too dangerous to station a sniper there.
“That building in particular has a sloped roof at its highest point,” she explained to the dismay of experts:
And so, you know, there’s a safety factor that would be considered there that we wouldn’t want to put somebody up on a sloped roof. And so, you know, the decision was made to secure the building, from inside.
That comment invited richly deserved ridicule from former military snipers.
“A sloped roof? That is a total BS excuse,” former Army Ranger Sean Parnell wrote on X:
Our snipers used to set in on mountain tops in Afghanistan. On the down slopes if need be.
The stupidity of this statement explains so much of why s*** hit the fan that day.
Absolute incompetence.
In testimony before the U.S. House Oversight Committee, Cheatle confessed that her agency blew it that day at the Butler Farm Show grounds.
She quit the following day.
The slope of the roof didn’t seem to bother Crooks, who opened fire with an AR-15 at 6:11 p.m. A Secret Service countersniper killed him with a headshot almost immediately.
Copenhaver Sad
Copenhaver, 74, is still recovering from the bullet wounds in his arm and abdomen.
His attorney told Fox News yesterday that Copenhaver, of Moon Township, Pennsylvania, is upset that political division is so great that someone would try to kill a presidential candidate at a campaign rally.
“Overall, he just wants people to understand how unnecessary it was and that the political divide in this country has become so great [that] people are literally willing to attend rallies where people are exercising their First Amendment rights and start firing bullets into crowds,” said Joseph Feldman:
“He’s 74 years old. He’s been around a long time. He’s witnessed a lot take place in this country. And this is definitely one of the worst things that he’s experienced as an American, and he wants people to understand that it does not have to be like this.” …
Copenhaver, Trump and most other rally attendees in the left section had turned their heads at the exact time shots were fired to look at immigration statistics projected onto a large screen to the left of the stage. It was at that moment Copenhaver looked down at his arm and saw it was bleeding.
“He had almost heard or even seen something kind of whizz past them, which we’re assuming is a bullet. And he… looked down at his arm and… felt pain initially, but he didn’t even realize that he had been shot a second time at that point,” Feldman explained. “He had mentioned that he was in quite a bit of shock at that time. There was a lot of pandemonium. People were screaming. No one really quite knew what was going on right away.”
Trump called Copenhaver after the shooting.
Also wounded was 57-year-old David Dutch, who came home from the hospital last week, Fox reported, citing a news release.
Comperatore, 50, died while covering his family from Crooks’ gunfire.
The Latest
The latest development on the assassination attempt came from GOP Senator Charles Grassley.
The Iowan released text messages and photographs of Crooks that local police shared in the minutes before the shooting.
“Kid learning [sic] around building we are in,” one message said. “[The] AGR [building] I believe it is. I did see him with a range finder looking towards stage. FYI. If you wanna notify SS snipers to look out. I lost sight of him. Also a bike with backpack sitting next to it in rear of building that was not seen earlier.”
An official time line of the events shows that Crooks could have and should have been stopped.
Officers spotted him at 5:10 p.m, a full hour before the shooting. They photographed him at 5:14 p.m. and photographed his bike at 5:28 p.m. They saw him “looking at phone, news feeds, and range finder confirmed through monoculars” at 5:32 p.m. From 5:34 p.m. on, the report shows, officers traded messages about Crooks’ location.
Local police covered the AGR building because it was outside the perimeter established by the Secret Service.
As well, Secret Service agents encountered Crooks with his range finder three hours before the shooting. The agency had repeatedly denied Trump’s request for fortified protection.
