Secret Service ‘solely responsible’ for implementation and execution of security at the Trump rally site, director tells CNN

CNN —

The US Secret Service was “solely responsible” for the implementation and execution of security at the site of Saturday’s rally for former President Donald Trump’s campaign, Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle told CNN in an interview Tuesday evening.

Cheatle added that no assets from the agency were diverted from the rally that day, even though there were other events in the state on Saturday requiring agency protection.

“At that particular site, we divided up areas of responsibility, but the Secret Service is totally responsible for the design and implementation and the execution of the site,” she told CNN.

In a prior interview with ABC News, Cheatle had said that local law enforcement was responsible for the building where 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks climbed onto the roof and fired shots at Trump at his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday.

“What I was trying to stress was that we just divided up areas of responsibility, and they provided support to those areas of responsibility,” Cheatle said of local law enforcement, adding that the agency “couldn’t do our job without them.”

Although a full advance had been completed that day, the director, said if “there are things that we need to change about our policies, or our procedures, or our methods, we are certainly going to do so.”

Cheatle didn’t provide specifics on where the USSS would make adjustments, saying the service is waiting for its own internal review and findings, as well as an external review.

US Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle looks on during a press conference at the Secret Service's Chicago Field Office on June 4.

CNN asked Cheatle if Trump’s security included a full Secret Service counter-assault team – the