A day after the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, the FBI announced that there is no evidence that the shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, had any psychiatric disorder. He acted alone and shot the former president with a gun that was legally owned by his father. Investigators are working on the hypothesis of “domestic terrorism.”
Trump himself arrived at the Republican Party convention in Milwaukee, where he is expected to be officially nominated as the presidential candidate. He has rewritten his speech to focus on national unity. The official announcement of the vice presidential candidate, which is still being kept secret, is also expected.
What impact will the assassination attempt have on the US election campaign? Did the Secret Service agents make mistakes? On the Nova TV show “Hello, Bulgaria”, international analyst Martin Tabakov and former Deputy Defense Minister Jordan Bozhilov discussed the issue.
“If such an incident has occurred, it means that there has been a security breach. Either due to negligence or due to an inadequate risk assessment… In my opinion, this violation of the protection perimeter is a security error,” Bozhilov said.
According to Tabakov, “there is shared responsibility and mistakes made by both the Secret Service and the FBI.” “The Secret Service allowed an attack to be carried out at a distance of 150 metres, in the immediate vicinity of the protected target. After the shooting, Trump was detained on the spot for a long period of time. He was then made to stand up, which made him a target again. These are mistakes by the Secret Service.” “The secret services were lucky that there was no second shooter,” the international analyst stressed.
According to Bozhilov, the assassination attempt gives Trump an advantage in the personal competition with Biden. “But I’m not sure that the election is predetermined. A lot can happen before November 5. We’ll see if Biden will be replaced by another candidate who will be Trump’s vice presidential candidate. The internal problems of American society – migration, unemployment, huge debt and division – will determine the results,” the expert said.
