A video that appears to show rally-goers screaming desperately after seeing a gunman on the roof of a building moments before opening fire on former President Donald Trump has gone viral.
An adult male was killed and two others were seriously injured in the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, according to the Secret Service, which shot and killed the gunman. The shooter, known as Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old from Bethel Park, Pennsylvania.
The video, posted in to hide.
The footage was shared through user @CollinRugg, co-owner of the news site Trending Politics, and has garnered more than 1. 9 million views since it was posted Saturday night.
BREAKING: New footage shows participants at Trump’s rally desperately yelling at authorities that there was someone with a gun in the most sensitive part of a structure. How on earth can the rally participants see the suspect in front of the secretariat and the police?”He’s got a gun! He’s got a gun!” they. . . pic. twitter. com/VaiNDp3ZH9
Newsweek may simply not be able to determine the veracity of the video.
Rugg wrote in the post that the other people in the video were screaming for authorities to intervene.
“How is it possible that the participants in the demonstration see the suspect in front of the secret and the police?” he wrote. They gave him a gun!They gave him a gun! They screamed before the shots rang out. “
Greg Smith, a witness to the events of the demonstration, told the BBC that it was a guy with a rifle “crawling” on a nearby roof minutes before shots were fired.
“We saw the bear crawling on the roof of the building next to us, 50 feet from us,” Smith said. “He had a gun; we may see a rifle. ” What followed, according to the witness, was a frantic attempt to alert the government to the imminent danger.
“Why is the Secret Service on all those rooftops here?It’s not a big place. ” He called the incident a “security failure, one hundred percent security failure. “
The Republican-controlled House of Representatives is going to investigate the assassination attempt. Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement on Saturday that the Director of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, and “other appropriate officials” from the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation would “appear for a hearing before our committees ASAP.”
The House oversight committee in a message to X said it had “invited” Cheatle to “testify at a hearing” on July 22.
“Americans are asking for answers about the assassination of President Trump,” the committee, led by Kentucky Republican Rep. James Comer, added in a statement.
Flynn Nicholls is a Newsweek reporter based in London, United Kingdom. It focuses on American politics and society. Originally from New Zealand, Flynn joined Newsweek in 2024 and had previously worked at Wairarapa Times-Age. He is a graduate of Victoria University of Wellington. Flynn can be reached by emailing f. nicholls@newsweek. com. Languages: English.
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