Former President Donald Trump accused Democrats of interfering with his 2024 campaign and messing with his crowd sizes by failing to marshal sufficient resources for the Secret Service to protect him.
Trump, 78, underscored the assassination attempts he has faced over recent months and alleged efforts by Iran to harm him while claiming that rallygoers have been turned away from his events due to the lack of resources from the Secret Service.
“The Democrats are interfering with my Campaign by not giving us the proper number of people within Secret Service that are necessary for Security,” Trump claimed on Truth Social Monday. “They’re using them for themselves, even though they don’t need them – they draw ‘flies’ — because they have no crowds.”
“We need more Secret Service, and we need them NOW. It is ELECTION INTERFERENCE that we have to turn away thousands of people from arenas and venues because it is not being provided to us,” he added. “With the weak crowd participation that the Democrats get, there should be plenty ‘left over’ for the Republican Party.”
His private frustrations with attendance during his Saturday rally in Wisconsin appeared to underpin Trump’s Truth Social screed.
“Hopefully the people of Wisconsin, and other areas where thousands are turned away, will realize that this is just another Democrat ploy!” he concluded the post.
Over the weekend, the former president, who has long fixated on his ability to draw large audiences, seethed over the crowd size he drew at his indoor rally Saturday in Prairie du Chien, Wisc., which is about two hours away from Madison.
“We had 50,000 people that showed up, but they didn’t want me to be outside. They said they couldn’t get us enough people because they were guarding the United Nations, and Iran, the president of Iran is here,” Trump said at an Erie, Pa. rally Sunday.
Secret Service had been forced to deploy resources to midtown Manhattan for the United Nation’s assembly last week, as they are responsible for protecting foreign heads-of-state, as well. However, it’s unclear if that actually impacted Trump’s crowd sizes.
Concerns about Trump’s safety have loomed large over the 2024 presidential contest.
The protective agency has been scrambling to ramp up protection for the 78-year-old former president, by erecting bulletproof glass near his podium at outdoor campaign events and taking other steps that haven’t been disclosed.
Before gaveling out of session for recess, Congress passed the Enhanced Presidential Security Act earlier this month to bolster Secret Service protection for the top presidential contenders. The bipartisan measure called for Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris to get the same level of protection as President Biden.
Additionally, both chambers of Congress wrangled through a spending patch last week that featured $231 million in added funding for the Secret Service. All of that came amid elevated concerns about the rise in political violence and threats made against Trump.
Trump had come within a quarter inch of death on July 13 during his rally in Butler, Pa. when a bullet clipped and drew blood from his right ear during a shooting that killed one and wounded two others. The gunman, Matthew Thomas Crooks, 20, was promptly killed by a countersniper.
Then, on Sept. 15, a Secret Service agent thwarted a second would-be Trump assassin, Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, from taking a shot at the former president at Trump International Golf Club West Palm Beach. Routh was found with an SKS semiautomatic rifle equipped with a scope at an apparent sniper’s nest, and prosecutors publicly filed a note from Routh making clear his intention to take out the GOP presidential nominee.
During a court appearance Monday, Routh pleaded not guilty to charges related to the alleged assassination attempt.
Law enforcement officials have also claimed to have foiled a plot by Iran to target Trump.
Multiple investigations into the Secret Service and assassination attempts against Trump are underway. Former Secret Service director Kimberly Cheatle stepped down in July amid a wave of backlash over the protective agency’s failings. Acting director Ronald Rowe has taken charge in the interim.
Trump previously lashed out at the Harris-Biden administration over the handling of the alleged assassination attempt on his golf course, decaying the initial batch of charges against Routh as a “slap on the wrist.” Prosecutors later added more charges against him.
