There has been a lot of hand-wringing and a few mea culpas from the Secret Service but, so far, little in the way of discernible action after the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. There are good reasons for figuring out what went wrong in Butler, PA, and making changes with all due haste: seventeen chaotic days in 1975 should provide ample motivation. That’s when two assassination attempts were carried out against President Gerald R. Ford.
A Harrowing Time
Sept. 5, 1975, Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme aimed a .45 caliber Colt handgun at Ford in Sacramento, CA. It was loaded with four rounds, but Fromme neglected to put one in the chamber. So when she squeezed the trigger, nothing happened. Fromme, a member of the notorious Manson Family, saw her desire to kill Ford go up in flames.
Only 17 days later, on Sept. 22, while leaving the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco, Sara Jane Moore fired a shot at the president but missed. When she tried to get off a second one, a heroic bystander stepped in and grabbed Moore’s raised arm. This man, Oliver Sipple – not a Secret Service agent – managed to thwart the killing of Ford. By most accounts, the second bullet ricocheted and hit a 42-year-old taxi driver who survived. The Secret Service whisked Ford away once the shots rang out, and local police were left to clean up the mess and take Moore into custody. “If I had had my .44 with me, I would have caught him,” Moore reportedly said.
Either the day or hours before (depending upon the source), police were said to have confiscated a .44 caliber revolver and 113 rounds of ammunition from Moore. However, she was not taken into custody or held by any of the authorities while Ford was in California. Several reports claim the 45-year-old mother was known to the Secret Service, which evaluated her and concluded that she “posed no danger to the president.”
But for the grace of God and two women who were unable to handle firearms, Ford would be on that list of American presidents who were cut down by an assassin’s bullet. It appears in both instances that the Secret Service did a fine job of springing into action once the assassination attempt had been made, but in a job where life and death hang in the balance, a day late and a dollar short doesn’t cut it.
This is the same charge being leveled at the Secret Service today following an attempt on the life of Trump. The news landed on July 16 that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. finally has been given Secret Service protection, but he could be forgiven for finding this cold comfort. The botched assassination plans of Fromme and Moore were child’s play next to a man with a rifle lying on a rooftop to take steady aim at the former president.
Still, what Americans are finding difficult to swallow in these early days are the multiple warnings by rally-goers who were directing authorities to the rooftop where they could plainly identify a man with a rifle. Logic would dictate that at least one of those charged with protecting Trump would check out what was happening that had eyewitnesses so exercised.
It’s been widely reported that a Butler Township policeman did climb up to the roof and take a peek, but when the gunman turned the rifle on him, he made a hasty retreat*. Thus far in the investigation, there’s no news as to why he did not try to take the shooter out. Moments after 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks spotted the officer, he began firing at President Trump.
Secret Service Slip-Ups
Looking back at the events in 1975, it’s clear the Secret Service knows what to do to extract a president from the scene of an attempted assassination. Famed agent Clint Hill, who covered Jackie Kennedy with his body on that fateful day in Dallas’ Dealey Plaza, was heroic, but his actions took place after her husband’s head was blown to bits.
The problem with the Secret Service appears to be in the run-up to these dastardly plots. In the cases of Moore and Lee Harvey Oswald, authorities had been warned of the threats these individuals posed. In the JFK assassination and the attempt on Trump’s life, the shooter sought the high ground; yet, in both instances, not even one law enforcement official took action. Even the casual observer will conclude the Service’s advanced planning appears to be sorely lacking, whether decades ago or just this month. This time, as in both instances in 1975, the men the assassins targeted managed to escape serious harm; however, the Service must get itself together before, God forbid, something like this happens again.
* Update: new information revealed on Thursday indicates that the officer was being hoisted onto the roof by another officer and was in no position to take aim at the assassin.
