Americans are losing confidence in Secret Service to protect presidents and candidates
A recent AP and NORC poll shows that after the attack on Donald Trump at the Butler rally, citizens doubt the federal agency's effectiveness.
Donald Trump after the attack on him.
The U.S. Secret Service is no longer trusted by Americans. According to a recent AP poll in collaboration with the NORC Research Center, following the assassination attempt against Trump in Butler, citizens no longer believe that the federal agency has the ability to protect the nation's presidents.
The poll, released Friday, claims that just 31% of Americans believe that the Secret Service can keep election candidates safe and prevent violent attacks on them.
For Republican voters surveyed, this confidence drops to 22%. The figure drops even further for independents, down one point. Democratic voters are those who have the most confidence in the federal agency. 43% said they were very confident about how well the Secret Service performs its duties.
The AP and NORC poll also focuses on the investigation the Department of Homeland Security has opened to shed light on what happened during the Butler shooting and how Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old armed with an AR-15-style rifle, was able to fire at former President and Republican candidate Donald Trump.
Overall confidence that this investigation will go well is relatively low. Just 36% of respondents said they have confidence that it will be done thoroughly. 34% have some confidence and 29% do not believe it will be done properly.
Again, those who have the most confidence in the Department of Homeland Security's investigation are Democratic voters, with 52% having strong confidence. Only 17% of Democrats do not trust the department led by Alejandro Mayorkas for this task.
At the same time, Republicans and independents are not as confident about the Biden Administration's work to investigate responsibility for the Butler shooting. Some 43% of Republicans distrust and 31% of independents feel the same way.
Secret Service under congressional investigation
The director of the Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, testified before Congress about the security breach and subsequently resigned. Acting director Ronald Rowe, who also spoke before lawmakers last month, admitted to being "embarrassed" about the shooting and said he "could not defend" why the roof had not been secured before the campaign event.
Rowe added this week that there were radio communication failures between the agencies in charge of security at the Butler rally that led to the rejection of a request by local law enforcement to cover the Butler rally with drones.
Democrats blame it on the Second Amendment
The AP and NORC poll also focused on the possible causes perceived by U.S. citizens that motivated the attempted assassination on Donald Trump by Thomas Matthew Crooks at the Pennsylvania rally.
Among all possible options, the preferred choice of Democratic voters is the Second Amendment. Eighty-one percent of Democrats polled claimed that the accessibility of firearms is what prompted the attack on the Republican candidate. This mass opinion of Democrats is the biggest gap compared to the views of independents and Republicans.
Across the board, Americans blame division and tension in national politics. Seventy-eight percent support this theory. Seventy-two percent believe the Secret Service is directly to blame and 59% believe it is the media that caused this situation. Republican voters favored this cause by 68%.
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