WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — The Trump campaign is increasing security at its offices in West Palm Beach, telling staff to stay away from campaign buildings here in Florida and Washington D.C.
The assassination attempt has raised many questions around security aimed especially the U.S. Secret Service.
We're told Trump's Mar-A-Lago estate is the defacto headquarters of the campaign in the Palm Beach area. You can see the increased security with secret service all over the lawn. We spoke with a security expert -- who calls what happened at the Pennsylvania rally "a total failure."
"So many failures on a bunch of different levels," said J.J. Johnson, CEO of Black Flag Protection.
Johnson says he's worked closely with Trump's campaign team in 2019 and 2020, before working with Governor Ron DeSantis he says he has a lot of questions about what happened in Butler, namely why it took so long to get trump off the stage.
"They stood on the stage for I don't know how long it was, but you know any longer than a couple of seconds is too long," Johnson said.
Trump supporters that came out to Mar-A-Lago, Monday morning had questions to share.
"The guy was, what, 150 yards away or something," recalled one supporter. "How is it possible that that was not a protected building?"
"I mean how could that happen," asked another. "[The gunman] didn't look like a professional. How did he slip by all that security?"
In a memo sent out by the Trump Campaign obtained by WPTV, it asks employees to steer clear of the dc and west palm offices as they assess security and bring on 24/7 armed security. It reads in part :
"In response to this violence, we encourage those of you who remain in DC and West Palm Beach to stay away from the office tomorrow, as we assess both locations. We are enhancing the armed security presence with 24/7 officers on-site. Additional security assessments will be in place. Our highest priority is to keep all of you on this staff safe. We also urge you to recognize the political polarization in this heated election. If something looks or feels off, please flag it immediately for leadership or an on-site security team."
We asked Johnson what measures he thinks security is taking.
"Making sure we're doing proper (explosive ordinance disposal) sweeps, making sure there's nothing at the campaign HQ that's not supposed to be there and that there are no people there that aren't supposed to be there," Johnson said.
While Johnson remains critical of the Secret Service, he says campaign events are difficult to control and those attending need to always be on alert:
"You know, going to attend any Trump rally people feel very strongly about him one way or the other, so there's always a risk when attending one of these things," Johnson said.
President Biden has pledged all necessary resources to protect the former president along with others on both sides of the aisle calling for protection increases for all candidates including RFK JR.
