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U.S. Secret Service report finds multiple failures before first Trump assassination attempt

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A report from the U.S. Secret Service said multiple communication and operational failures happened on the day a lone gunman shot at former President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania in July.

A summary of the agency’s investigation pointed to a cascade of errors that preceded the attempt on Trump’s life while he spoke at a rally on July 13 in Butler, Pennsylvania. One of the gunman’s shots struck Trump’s ear.

“It is important that we hold ourselves to account for the failures of July 13 and that we take the lessons learned to make sure that we do not have another mission failure like this again,” Acting Director Ronald Rowe said.

Rowe said the agency needs “a shift in paradigm in how we conduct our operations.” That will include more people, equipment and technology.

The internal report, which is separate from other congressional investigations, first pointed at communication failures. For example, the report noted that some local police didn’t know there were two separate communications centers on site and mistakenly thought the Secret Service was directly receiving their radio transmissions.

Another communication problem was that the local tactical team, operating on the second floor of the AGR building where the shooter attacked from the roof, had yet to contact Secret Service personnel before the rally.

“Multiple law enforcement entities involved in securing the rally questioned the efficacy of that local sniper team’s positioning in the AGR building, yet there was no follow-up discussion about modifying their position,” according to the report.

Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, shot at Trump from a nearby rooftop. U.S. Secret Service agents returned fire and killed Crooks. A firefighter attending the rally was killed and two others were injured.

The report noted concerns about the July 13 rally’s venue at the Butler Farm Show site. An advance team recognized those concerns, but measures to address those problems weren’t taken.

“There was a lack of detailed knowledge by Secret Service personnel regarding the state or local law enforcement presence that would be present in and around the AGR complex,” according to the report. “There was also a lack of knowledge regarding the specific footprint of resources that would buttress the secure area of the venue and separate it from the AGR complex, which was outside of the site’s secure perimeter.”

The internal report said communication problems were the cause of the failures. It said, “different radio frequencies used at the Butler Farm Show venue were not conducive for quickly sharing real-time information.”

“The failure of personnel to broadcast via radio the description of the assailant, or vital information received from local law enforcement regarding a suspicious individual on the roof of the AGR complex, to all federal personnel at the Butler site inhibited the collective awareness of all Secret Service personnel,” the report said.

Better communication could have made a difference.

“If this information was passed over Secret Service radio frequencies it would have allowed [Trump’s] protective detail to determine whether to move their protectee while the search for the suspicious suspect was in progress,” according to the report. “Vital information was transmitted via mobile/cellular devices in staggered or fragmented fashion instead of being relayed via the Secret Service radio network.”

An advance drone team reported technical problems that could have spotted Crooks before the rally.

“It is possible that if this element of the advance had functioned properly, the shooter may have been detected as he flew his drone near the Butler Farm Show venue earlier in the day,” according to the report.

The agency will finalize the report in the coming weeks.

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How convenient: Minnesota day care reports break-in, records gone

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A Minneapolis day care run by Somali immigrants is claiming that a mysterious break-in wiped out its most sensitive records, even as police say officers were never told that anything was actually stolen — a discrepancy that’s drawing sharp attention amid Minnesota’s spiraling child care fraud scandal.

According to the center’s manager, Nasrulah Mohamed, someone forced their way into Nakomis Day Care Center earlier this week by entering through a rear kitchen area, damaging a wall and accessing the office. Mohamed told reporters the intruder made off with “important documentation,” including children’s enrollment records, employee files, and checkbooks tied to the facility’s operations.

But a preliminary report from the Minneapolis Police Department tells a different story. Police say no loss was reported to officers at the time of the call. While the department confirmed the center later contacted police with additional information, an updated report was not immediately available.

Video released by the day care purporting to show damage from the incident depicts a hole punched through drywall inside what appears to be a utility closet, with stacks of cinder blocks visible just behind the wall — imagery that has only fueled skepticism as investigators continue to unravel what authorities have described as one of the largest fraud schemes ever tied to Minnesota’s human services programs.

Mohamed blamed the alleged break-in on fallout from a viral investigation by YouTuber Nick Shirley, who recently toured nearly a dozen Minnesota day care sites while questioning whether they were legitimately operating. Shirley’s video has racked up more than 110 million views. Mohamed insisted the coverage unfairly targeted Somali operators and said his center has since received what he described as hateful and threatening messages.

“This is devastating news, and we don’t know why this is targeting our Somali community,” Mohamed said, calling Shirley’s reporting false. Nakomis Day Care Center was not among the facilities featured in the video.

The break-in claim surfaced as law enforcement and federal officials continue to expose a massive fraud network centered in Minneapolis, involving food assistance, housing, and child care payments. Authorities say at least $1 billion has already been identified as fraudulent, with federal prosecutors warning the total could climb as high as $9 billion. Ninety-two people have been charged so far, 80 of them Somali immigrants.

Late Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced it was freezing all federal child care payments to Minnesota unless the state can prove the funds are being used lawfully. The payments totaled roughly $185 million in 2025 alone.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, under intensifying scrutiny for allowing fraud to metastasize for years, responded by attacking the Trump administration rather than addressing the substance of the findings. “This is Trump’s long game,” Walz wrote on X Tuesday night, claiming the administration was politicizing fraud enforcement to defund programs — despite federal officials pointing to documented abuse and ongoing criminal cases.

Meanwhile, questions continue to swirl around facilities already flagged by investigators. Reporters visiting several sites highlighted in Shirley’s video found at least one — Quality “Learing” Center — operating with children inside despite state officials previously saying it had been shut down. The Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families later issued a confusing clarification, saying the center initially reported it would close but later claimed it would remain open.

As Minnesota scrambles to respond to the funding freeze and mounting arrests, the conflicting accounts surrounding the Nakomis Day Care incident underscore a broader problem confronting state leaders: a system so riddled with gaps and contradictions that even basic facts — like whether records were actually stolen — are now in dispute, while taxpayers are left holding the bill.

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International

Trump confirms first American land strike against Venezuelan narco networks

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President Trump confirmed Friday that U.S. forces have carried out what he described as the first American land strike on a Venezuelan smuggling facility, marking a significant escalation in his administration’s campaign against narco-terror networks tied to the regime of Nicolás Maduro.

The disclosure came unexpectedly during a live radio broadcast on New York’s WABC Radio, when billionaire businessman and guest host John Catsimatidis told listeners his phone was ringing mid-segment — and that the caller was the president. Catsimatidis, who was filling in on Sid and Friends in the Morning, said he had been exchanging text messages with Trump the night before about U.S. military action against Islamic State targets in northern Nigeria. Trump, he said, decided to call in unannounced to discuss a range of global security issues, including maritime drug interdictions in the Caribbean and Pacific.

During that conversation, Trump revealed that U.S. forces had already struck a key Venezuelan smuggling hub on land. “I don’t know if you read it or saw it — they have a big plant or a big facility where the ships come from,” Trump said on air. “Two nights ago we knocked that out. So we hit them very hard.”

The president did not identify the location of the facility or detail how the operation was carried out. Still, the comment appeared to confirm what Trump had been signaling publicly for weeks — that his crackdown on Venezuelan narco-terror operations would soon move beyond sea interdictions. Trump ordered U.S. forces to begin targeting drug-running boats in September and has repeatedly warned that land-based operations were coming.

In a Thanksgiving Day call with U.S. military personnel, Trump said efforts to stop Venezuelan traffickers “by land” would begin “very soon,” adding that “the land is easier.” He reiterated that message on December 11, telling reporters at the White House that land operations were imminent. If the timeline Trump laid out Friday is accurate, the strike took place less than two weeks after those remarks.

The left-leaning New York Times later reported that unnamed officials had confirmed the strike occurred but declined to provide specifics. According to the paper, U.S. officials would not disclose where the site was located, how it was targeted, or what precise role it played in drug trafficking, and there has been no public acknowledgment from Maduro’s government or other regional authorities.

Even with those details still under wraps, Trump’s remarks represent the clearest confirmation yet that U.S. military action against Venezuelan smuggling networks has expanded onto sovereign territory — a move that underscores how far his administration is willing to go to dismantle drug pipelines tied to hostile regimes in the Western Hemisphere.

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