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The Secret Service is planning on protecting former President Donald Trump at outdoor rallies by surrounding his podium with bulletproof glasses, a measure usually only employed when guarding sitting presidents, ABC News reported.
It comes after the assassination attempt on July 13 when Trump’s right ear was grazed by a bullet at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. One rally attendee was killed and two others were injured. It was the first attempted assassination of a candidate for president since the 1972 attempt on the life of George Wallace.
President Ronald Reagan was shot but survived after an assassination attempt on March 30, 1981.
The Secret Service advised the Trump campaign to stop holding outdoor rallies following the July shooting, when a 20-year-old gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, took aim at Trump from a rooftop about 400 feet from the podium.
All of Trump’s campaign events have subsequently been indoors but the former president has said that he wants to return to outdoor rallies and has asked if it would be safe, sources told ABC.
On July 31, about two weeks after the shooting, Trump noted the size of the indoor arena during a rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
“They’d prefer that we be in an arena. I don’t know why. But we’re not giving up the outdoor rallies,” he said at the time. “You know, all those people that we had to turn away today, at an outdoor rally you can have.”
Trump is set to have glass panels cover him from three sides at the podium at future outdoor rallies, but it remains unclear when the practice will begin.
Retired Secret Service agent Don Mihalek told the outlet, “This isn’t just a piece of glass but a large, bulky, and heavy armored glass that will require extensive logistics capability, normally reserved for large-scale outdoor events.”
The ballistic glass is usually transported on a military cargo plane but for Trump, the Secret Service is set to purchase several sets to store across the country so that they can be taken by truck to a rally venue, sources told ABC.
Following the Butler shooting, former Secret Service Director Kim Cheatle, who was recently forced to resign, increased security for Trump, Vice President Kamala Harris as well as the two vice presidential contenders, Ohio Senator JD Vance and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.
This also applies to other protectees, such as Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff.
