Trump Shooter Reportedly Flew Drone Over Location Soon Before Event
WSJ: “Thomas Matthew Crooks flew the drone on a programmed flight path earlier in the day on July 13 to scour the Butler Farm Show grounds ahead of Trump’s ill-fated rally”
This is getting just too strange. “If true” this report puts Secret Service incompetence at a whole new level. The gunman reportedly flew a drone over the venue not long before the event.
From The Wall Street Journal:
The gunman who tried to kill Donald Trump was able to fly a drone and get aerial footage of the western Pennsylvania fairgrounds shortly before the former president was set to speak there, law-enforcement officials briefed on the matter said, further underscoring the stunning security lapses ahead of Trump’s near assassination.
Thomas Matthew Crooks flew the drone on a programmed flight path earlier in the day on July 13 to scour the Butler Farm Show grounds ahead of Trump’s ill-fated rally, the officials said. The predetermined path, the officials added, suggests Crooks flew the drone more than once as he researched and scoped out the event site.
Other aspect of the planning were covered also by WSJ:
Police had become suspicious of Crooks more than an hour earlier, when officers saw him milling about the edges of the rally with a range finder and a backpack.
The use of the drone was just one way in which authorities have said Crooks planned his attack. Crooks, described by friends as very smart yet withdrawn, began researching the site shortly after the Trump campaign announced the rally on July 3, and registered for the event on July 7, officials said. He visited the farm show grounds a few days later to scope it out.
On July 13, officials said, he returned with a pair of homemade bombs that appeared to be designed to be set off by remote control, as they were fitted with a receiver like the kind used to set off fireworks remotely. Investigators found the rudimentary explosives in Crooks’ car parked close to the grounds, along with a ballistic carrier, or vest, with three, 30-round magazines in it, an indication that he might have wanted to cause greater carnage.
It’s hard to think of a more complete failure.
But a drone? A drone!
Just to underscore how crazy this all is, I was once prevented flying MY OWN drone off of the beach at Mar-a-Lago by USSS because my father was inside the house…
Now we have one literally scouting his speech!!! 🤬 https://t.co/M3BAENqT4f— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) July 20, 2024
He flew a drone. He had a range finder. He carried an AR-15 and a ladder over a mile.
You’re telling me this kid with the physique of a World of Warcraft addict somehow Jason Bourned an entire Secret Service detail?
Just doesn’t add up. pic.twitter.com/MCc4kuusdn
— Robert Sterling (@RobertMSterling) July 19, 2024
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Comments
Dude could have hovered a Kamov KA 26 over the rally and the ss wouldn’t have paid a bit of attention.
I don’t know what to say. Good thing it wasn’t a flamethrower drone.
Even Barney Fife would have had this kid locked up.
I think you mean Andy Taylor. Barney Fife would have Mother Teresa locked up.
lord–apparently he could’ve been carrying a sign–the indifference / incompetence of those assigned as the ” security detail ” was inexcusable or deliberate
Patsy. Decoy. Red herring.
I want to know who the real gunman is.
The FBI wants us to believe the shooter is an identifiable cross between Rambo and Jason Bourne.
With all the good toys, too. A drone. Big boom-booms in his car, with radio detonators. Encrypted communication units.
Thank heavens for Democrats’ AR15 Derangement Syndrome, or they might have given him a weapons platform that actually would have taken out his target, (But demonizing “bolt action hunting rifles” wouldn’t have polled well at all, and right now they can’t afford that luxury.)
So this 20 year old had a drone and Secret Service did not? Where were the positions of two critically injured men compared to this shooters line of sight? None of the forensic photos show where they were located. Why?
Here’s a report that says there were (at least) two weapons fired at President Trump: An audio analysis taken from the actual videos,
https://x.com/NetworksManager/status/1814416156859502949
Are you sure the second isn’t the return fire?
I didn’t do the analysis nor am I a ballistics expert. The author is saying there were two shooters, possibly a third. He identifies the shots he believes came from Crooks’ weapon and three shots, in which he describes, were taken from two different weapons, the last shot being the sniper’s kill shot. To prove or disprove this analysis is complicated but can be done, but one would assume they need to find all of the bullets first.
Logically, the three weapons theory could be explained as belonging to:
1) Crooks
2) The SS CST sniper
3) Butler Township police taking shots at Crooks
I agree that the revelations don’t add up and beggar belief. I still haven’t seen an explanation of how the shooter’s body was supposedly identified using DNA, despite his absence of a criminal record. And, we’re supposed to believe that the FBI can’t access his phone data? Please.
It’s not hard to imagine Deep State partisans at CIA, FBI and SS conspiring to create conditions and recruit/manipulate patsies to enable an assassination attempt. If one contends that President Trump is allegedly a reincarnation of Adolf Hitler, as the vile Dhimmi-crat apparatchiks and their media shills/lapdogs/trained seals have done, ad nauseam, since 2015, then it is an alleged moral duty to eliminate him.
If he ever had any medical procedure, his DNA was probably on file somewhere.
And it’s completely plausible that the FBI would have trouble getting into someone’s phone. They had the same problem with the San Bernardino terrorist, and even tried to force Apple to crack it for them, until they found a consultant who could do it. Maybe they should give that person a call. (Maybe they have; the report that they couldn’t get in was very early.)
There are reports that the parents called the cops BEFORE the shooting, to report that the kid and the gun had gone missing. Reasonable to assume that made the kid’s home a scene of interest after the shooting, and from there a DNA match was one step.
Loner, almost zero friends. Possibly mental issues. Yet he is sophisticated enough to recon on the ground and in the air, build explosive IED’s, train with an AR-15 style weapon. Purchase a small amount of ammo so as not to bring attention to his plans. All while his parents living in the same house have no clue. Speculation on my part, this kid had a handler. I don’t trust the fbi to handle this investigation at all. FJB
None of those things is all that difficult. And lefties seem to think that 50 rounds is a huge amount, and ought to have triggered all kinds of red flags!
And we keep hearing about these “bombs” in his car, rigged up with radio receivers. Seen a single word about finding any transmitters? Me, neither. Were the bombs sitting on his back seat, or were they neatly hidden under the driver’s seat? Follow the scent of decomp to all the details they AREN’T providing.
The FBI is the cover-up team and the clean-up crew of State-originated crimes. Why hasn’t AGR, or whoever is the current owner of the building that the gunman used issued a statement? No leaks whatsoever, fancy that!
AOC says the secret service was not at fault since the roof was equipped with gutter guards.
If we find out that the drone could sense wind speed and direction, my suspicion will be elevated to THREATCON RED.
Exactly. The WSJ article establishes the fact that Crooks deployed a drone on the day of the shooting. But it doesn’t tell us why he used it, whose drone he used, or who trained him on the use.
You’d get more timely information on wind just by calling up the Windy app.
Or by looking at the flag on the stage…