Mohave Today

Arizona State Rep. John Gillette (R-30), who previously worked security detail for Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama and labeled July’s attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump (R) as a security policy “mistake that just doesn’t happen”—expressed that the second attempt on Trump’s life at his West Palm Beach, Fla. golf club on Sept. 15 is grounds for even further strengthening of his security protocols.

Currently, Gillette ranked Trump’s security protocol measures as a “2” on a hypothetical scale of 1-4.

“Let’s say you have a 1-4 [scale of] security protocol: ‘1’ being very loose security in an open area in Pennsylvania, now they’ve bumped it up to a number ‘2’ or ‘2.5’ status; to where we have a little bit bigger perimeter, we have a few more personnel detailed to the event, but we’re still not controlling everything within the sphere of the president,” Gillette told Mohave Today.

“Nor should we, because that is very detrimental to everyone around him. So, we can’t block off every street, stop every cell phone from ringing, stop every aircraft from flying, we can’t control all the airspace. But a Level ‘3’, where you have the close protection detail, an inner perimeter, the counter-assault team and an outer perimeter, to me, would seem like the right call.”

Prior to his stint in the Arizona legislature, Gillette served in the U.S. Army, within law enforcement counter-terrorism units and on Department of Defense security protection details for both Presidents Bush and Obama.

“This shooter, the second shooter [Ryan Wesley Routh], was on the Homeland Security radar. He came back from Ukraine, we know he contacted the Afghans, we know he contacted the Russians. Even the Ukrainian government said, ‘Hey, this guy’s not right.’ So when he came back into the country, he had extra questioning, extra security protocols and he was put on a Homeland Security list,” Gillette said.

“He’s known to the government as someone very suspicious. He had previous arrests for barricading himself, he is a felon in possession of a firearm, he went overseas and made all these contacts in Ukraine, came back. Our government felt he was suspicious enough to put him on a list and give him some extra scrutiny, but we know now that he made a BlackRock commercial just like the first shooter [Thomas Matthew Crooks], he donated to ActBlue, known facts. Once those two connections were made, you think we would ramp up our surveillance of this guy.”

Gillette said that once Routh flew from his home in Hawaii and arrived in Florida, the home of former President Trump, he should “have a detail on him 24/7.”

“I won’t throw the Secret Service totally under the bus on this one, because they did have at least a secondary perimeter. I don’t know who made up that perimeter, but I’m thinking it’s some counter-assault team members. Some skilled members were out there in that secondary perimeter, because they did spot [Routh’s position] in advance. That could be from the poor camouflage, cover and concealment that the shooter used. They mentioned the barrel of the rifle sticking out,” Gillette said.

“Any experienced shooter would know to be deeper in the wood line to conceal yourself, so he made some tactical errors that the Secret Service team picked up on. They identified a threat, engaged the threat, actually shot at the threat, but the threat was able to get outside the outer perimeter because it wasn’t there, or it was so loose that he was able to get to his vehicle.”

Gillette credited the quick action of a civilian bystander in getting a photo of the license plate of Routh’s vehicle, which helped lead to his arrest—and again commended the Secret Service for identifying and engaging the threat, but maintained the assailant was able to position himself much too close to Trump.

“It still would appear that we’re lacking in security protocol for the president,” Gillette said.

Gillette explained opposition rhetoric, like calling Trump a threat to democracy and comparing him to Adolf Hitler, may be read by “mentally-unstable” individuals like the assailants in both of these incidents, as a call to taking drastic action.

Meanwhile, Gillette added that, in reference to the first attempt on Trump’s life in July, information on that assailant, Crooks, had “dried up to a trickle.”

“We’re not learning anything new. I think all we’re going to learn about [it] until it’s put to bed, is the shooter being dead, we know that they had access through his cell phone, we know there were calls back and forth from D.C., they tracked his cell phone. He had made many trips back and forth to D.C. We still don’t know what those trips were for, we don’t know who he met, there’s a lot more to that story and the Secret Service needs to own that. We need the backstory on that,” Gillette said.

Gillette stated that after previously calling for the resignation of the former Director of the Secret Service, Kimberly A. Cheatle, new acting Director Ronald L. Rowe Jr. appears to be “following in the same footsteps of not providing the information to the people,” which Gillette termed as “bothersome.”