New text messages between law enforcement paint picture of lead up to Trump rally shooting

WASHINGTON (TND) — Former President Donald Trump has agreed to an FBI interview regarding the attempted assassination at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania earlier this month.

According to the head of the FBI's Pittsburgh field office, Kevin Rojek, it will be a standard victim interview.

New text messages show local snipers had eyes on the gunman an hour and a half before the shooting and that the gunman was watching law enforcement. The New York Times obtained the messages from Senator Chuck Grassley’s office.

The messages show more than an hour and a half before Trump took the stage on July 13, a local counter sniper took notice of the shooter as he walked to his car at the end of his shift. The individual texted colleagues ” Someone followed our lead and snuck in and parked by our cars just so you know" and added, “He knows you guys are up there he’s sitting at a picnic table about 50 yards from the exit.”

The newly published messages show at 4:26 p.m. the first counter sniper texted his colleagues about a suspicious person sitting on a nearby picnic table. At 5:14 p.m. another local counter sniper took photos of the gunman. At 5:38 p.m. those photos were shared in the local officers' group chat with the suggestion they notify the Secret Service. At 6:11 the gunman aimed and fired.

Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., is preparing to press the new acting director of the Secret Service, Ronald Rowe Jr., during a public hearing Tuesday on Capitol Hill.

We’ll get a little bit more information about how that timeline developed and the lack of communication and why in heaven's name the Secret Service cleared Donald Trump to go on that stage at 6 o’clock and did not pause that event," said Blackburn.

On Sunday, a local SWAT team officer told ABC News they were supposed to have an in-person meeting with Secret Service snipers ahead of the rally, but that meeting never happened.

"That was probably a pivotal point where I started thinking things were wrong because we had no communication with the Secret Service," said Jason Owens.

Owens told ABC they had contact with the Secret Service only after the shooting.

Members of Trump’s personal Secret Service detail and top Trump advisors said they were not informed local police were tracking a suspicious person.

Trump is now vowing to go back to holding outdoor rallies writing on Truth Social that the Secret Service has agreed to “substantially step up their operation" and “they are very capable of doing so."

As critics pile on the Secret Service, Trump continues to praise the agents that surrounded him.

You talk about bravery, they jumped on top of me. They shielded my body and we have to remember that too," Trump told a crown in Minnesota on Saturday.

The former president is also making plans to head back to Butler, Pennsylvania for a rally to honor Corey Comperatore, the man who died from a fatal gunshot wound at the first Butler, PA rally.