Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green, R-Tenn., stressed the need for a thorough investigation into the security failures at the Donald Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, during a live interview with Newsmax at the Republican National Convention on Thursday.
Responding to a question about his investigative course of action, Green said on "The Record With Greta Van Susteren," "So whenever you do an operation like this — and I'm an ex-army guy, I was in a special forces task force, special operations task force — we're always working with other agencies, but you have rules of engagement. You have instructions to those other agencies."
The shooting raised serious concerns about how the suspect was able to access a nearby rooftop with a direct line of sight to where the former president was speaking.
"That's a risk you never take with the president of the United States or anybody," he said.
"In this particular case," he continued, "there's an inner perimeter run by the Secret Service. [On] the outer perimeter, there are instructions to those guys when to detain someone. What [and] how the communications work. This was a total breakdown. And we've got to get to the bottom of it.
"We need to get the perspective of those local law enforcement, the state police [and] understand what the Secret Service laid down for them as instructions, and find out where the true fault lies," he added.
When asked if he wanted to know the specifics of how local law enforcement executed their duties according to Secret Service guidelines, Green confirmed we need to know "exactly what the guidelines [are]. You know, what the guidelines were and all of that, that they were given and the communications during the operation, how they were talking, what networks they were on. Who had instructions to shoot to kill when a bad guy was there? What [were the] rules of engagement? We've got to know."
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Jim Thomas ✉
Jim Thomas is a writer based in Indiana. He holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science, a law degree from U.I.C. Law School, and has practiced law for more than 20 years.
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