With the 2024 presidential campaign in the home stretch, former President Trump is traveling about the country, holding his trademark rallies, and he is hitting the battleground states hard. One of those states is Wisconsin, but as of Thursday morning, a Trump rally scheduled for a large outdoor venue in Wisconsin has been scrubbed. The rally will now take place in a smaller indoor venue. The reason? The Secret Service informed the Trump campaign that they lacked sufficient resources to secure the site.
The campaign was notified that the Secret Service “lacked the manpower and assets” to secure the outdoor venue, reportedly at an airport. The rally has been moved to an indoor venue, the Prairie du Chien Are Arts Center. Prairie du Chien is a small city in west-central Wisconsin on the banks of the Mississippi River.
While it’s probably a prudent act for the Secret Service to so inform the Trump campaign if they are short on resources — and while the indoor venue is no doubt easier to secure than an outdoor site — the reasons for this lack of resources are interesting, to say the least. NBC News reports:
The Trump campaign had planned to host a rally in Wisconsin at an outdoor airport venue Saturday, but was told by the Secret Service that it did not have the manpower and assets to secure the venue while the United Nations General Assembly meeting was happening in New York, an official familiar with the planning told NBC News.
The Secret Service notified the campaign of the issue sometime last week, leaving it a week and a half to “readjust,” the official said. The source described the notification by the USSS as a “last-ish minute” change.
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This presents some questions:
First, is not the United Nations responsible for/expected to provide security for its premises and events? Are not the member nations responsible for the security of their representatives?
Second, United States officials attending United Nations events may well be accorded Secret Service protection, but the United Nations has been present since shortly after World War 2; this certainly isn’t the first time a presidential campaign with the requisite public appearances has happened at the same time as a United Nations General Assembly meeting. How is it that the Secret Service is only now having issues covering both events?
Third, it’s important to note that the two attempts on the life of former President Trump have increased the sense of urgency in his protective detail, so this rally move to an indoor venue is probably the prudent move. Indoor venues are, obviously, easier to secure with limited resources.
At the Prairie du Chien rally, former President Trump is expected to hammer the Harris/Biden administration on the border, immigration, and energy.
