Recent reports indicate that the parents of 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks had contacted the authorities before his assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump during his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, last weekend. Based on the latest information, the motive of the young shooter is still unknown.
Fox News reported that Crooks’ mother and father had called the police because their son had been missing, and they were worried about his well-being. It is unclear if they knew at the time that he was in possession of his father’s AR-15. It is also unknown what actions local law enforcement took after receiving the call about Crooks.
When the news initially broke, Fox News host Harris Faulkner reported from the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, “We have just learned that the Trump rally shooter Thomas Crooks’s parents were looking for him in the hours leading up to the shooting. We’re now told they eventually called law enforcement to report that crooks was missing and they were worried.”
Faulkner further questioned what motivated the parents to be concerned about the welfare of their son, stating, “We don’t know the texture or the details of their concerns. So in other words, what were they worried that he had a gun … What were they worried about? Were they worried that he was going to try to attempt to kill a sitting president and then go ahead and assassin, turn into an assassin and kill another person and injure to others.”
During the rally, Crooks managed to access a rooftop relatively close to where Trump was speaking, having a line of sight to the podium. Many have wondered how the shooter was able to evade the Secret Service and law enforcement where he could fire off multiple shots at the president. Miraculously, Trump walked away from the attempt on his life only having a bullet graze his ear.
Subsequently, many are demanding answers as to what led to the complete lapse in security that allowed Crooks to fire off multiple rounds and nearly kill a former president and presidential candidate. United States Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, known for her diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives within the critical security organization, has come under fire.
The American Tribune reported on comments from House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), who publicly stated that he is prepared to call for Cheatle’s firing amid the gross negligence at the Trump rally. Furthermore, the director has been subpoenaed to testify before Congress amid an investigation into what went wrong at the Pennsylvania rally.
Watch the Fox News report on the information surrounding Crooks below:
Johnson said, “I’m prepared this morning to call on President Biden to fire Director Cheatle. Yesterday I said that she should resign. It’s clear that she has no intention to do so. But the oversight here, the mistakes, the ineptitude, whatever it is, was inexcusable.” He maintained that the information that has been obtained thus far is unsatisfactory. “They did not give us satisfactory answers to some very important questions, and some of it needs to be in a classified setting, I suppose,” he added.
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