(NewsNation) — It’s a mystery to former Secret Service agent Donald Lane how the Butler Township, Pennsylvania rally site where a young man tried to kill former President Donald Trump was not better protected.
“It shouldn’t even have gotten to that level of chaos because there should have been a more controlled scene,” Lane told NewsNation’s “Elizabeth Vargas Reports” on Thursday.
Lane focused on what he believed was poor inter-agency communication, especially regarding the various law enforcement agencies’ radios. He says the standard protocol is to have a “security room” in which someone from every agency involved is represented.
“An officer can make a radio transmission to an officer in that security room. Then the Secret Service becomes aware of it and then can relay it back out. Why that didn’t happen here, I don’t know.”
Lane spoke about the body camera footage released by the Butler Township Police Department. In one portion of the video, an officer can be heard complaining that his agency told the Secret Service days before the event that the building from which the shooter fired needed direct Secret Service protection.
As for when officers first had reports of a possible armed man on the grounds before Trump arrived, “How in the world did it not get to the agents around the president?” Lane asked.
“Why wasn’t the building better controlled in terms of security? It looks like it was just a free-for-all.”
Now-resigned Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle has said the building where the gunman perched was the responsibility of local law enforcement.
