Homeland Security secretary names independent panel to review Trump assassination attempt

Associated Press

Updated: Jul 22, 2024 / 04:58 AM CDT

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is helped off the stage by U.S. Secret Service agents at a campaign event in Butler, Pa., on Saturday, July 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has appointed a bipartisan, independent panel to review this month’s assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, officials said Sunday.

The panel members will have “extensive law enforcement and security experience to conduct a 45-day independent review of the planning for and actions taken by the U.S. Secret Service and state and local authorities before, during, and after the rally, and the U.S. Secret Service governing policies and procedures,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement.

The first people named to the panel are former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano; Frances Townsend, former Homeland Security adviser to President George W. Bush; Mark Filip, a former federal judge and deputy attorney general to President George W. Bush; and David Mitchell, former secretary of the Department of Public Safety and Homeland Security for the state of Delaware.

Additional experts could be asked to join the group in the coming days, the statement said.

The panel will have 45 days to review the policies and procedures of the Secret Service before, during and after the rally July 13 where a gunman fired at Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“We formed this bipartisan group to quickly identify improvements the U.S. Secret Service can implement to enhance their work. We must all work together to ensure events like July 13 do not happen again,” members of the independent review panel said in a joint statement.

Secret Service Director Kim Cheatle said she welcomes the review.

“I look forward to the panel examining what happened and providing recommendations to help ensure it will never happen again,” Cheatle said in a statement Sunday. “The U.S. Secret Service is continuing to take steps to review our actions internally and remain committed to working quickly and transparently with other investigations, including those by Congress, FBI and the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General.”

Cheatle is set to testify Monday before the House Oversight Committee.