Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) said a report about the attempted assassination of former President Trump could come out by the end of the year.
The House unanimously approved a task force last week to investigate the assassination attempt against Trump, who was shot at during a rally in Butler, Pa., on July 13. When asked if it was “feasible” to put together a report on the incident by the end of the year on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” McCaul said it was.
“I think so. I went out to the site. I went up to the rooftop. This individual should never been that close to the president of the United States. It was very, very close. And the fact that he even got there in the first place was a failure. It should have been stopped,” he told host Robert Costa.
“What’s interesting, Robert, is that he had a detonation device on him and two bombs in the car. What his plan was, was to assassinate the president, create a diversion by blowing up his vehicle on the other side of the property, and then he could escape,” he said.
McCaul said he did not know if he would be on the task force investigating the incident, but he would serve on it if asked. He also said that he was “glad” to see former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resign from her post in the wake of the assassination attempt on the former president.
“And I’m glad that Director Cheatle did the right thing and resigned like President Reagan’s director of Secret Service did. Anytime you have an attempted assassination, that is a failure and she said that herself. I think the agents are good. I think the problem is the president is under a lot of threats obviously and one from Iran as well. They asked for additional agents, they were not given that,” he said.
The incident sparked concerns and raised questions over how the gunman was able to get close enough to get a shot off at the former president in the first place.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) announced the bipartisan task force last week to investigate the attempted assassination of Trump. The former president was struck in the ear with a bullet when a gunman opened fire during his rally in Pennsylvania earlier this month. The gunman was killed by a countersniper after he targeted the former president.