Wait - it was all the fault of women in the Secret Service? Glenn Grothman on Trump on R4.

[DisneyHag]

Did I seriously hear that right? At about 6.54am on the Today programme, just now. Republican representative Glenn Grothman says the Secret Service is ‘so busy being woke they’re more concerned with employing women than ensuring they do a good job’. (Slight paraphrase.)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qj9z

This is him a couple of days ago:

newrepublic.com/post/183778/republican-rep-goes-unhinged-rant-women-emasculating-men

This kind of brings us back full circle to the question that started the thread.

I think the other things are being questioned just as loudly (or at least it is from what I have seen over the past few days) but the agents who were incompetent and happened to be women and happened to be on camera in prominent positions has become it’s own narrative among many.

But really, they did no favors to themselves, ironically the short one in front has gotten the least criticism from what I’ve see (and rightly so, she seemed to know what she was doing).

There were men there looking confused too. It's just that if three people look like they don't know what they are doing, and one is a woman, the focus is on the woman. It seems to be much more a thing in the American right than the UK or European right to be fair. But it's annoying, especially when the people making the comments aren't particularly knowledgeable in that field and often have never had to risk anything.
It's the same as the army - if there are no women killed in action then it's all "you see women only want equality when it suits them" and gets brought up every time you bring up DV deaths etc. If there are women getting killed on the battlefield then clearly they were incompetent and didn't belong there.

Police inspector Amy Scott was exemplary in the recent mall shooting in Australia. Her lightening fast reaction saved many.
Are there many examples of gun owning Americans stopping a mass shooting? If carrying weapons makes them feel safer, it would be interesting to see if they prevent any.

I think the time between the people seeing him on the roof and telling the police officer and the shooting starting was very short, like a minute from the video i saw. Maybe there was stuff which happened before the video started?

Some reports are saying the police/secret agent sniper had then looked that way and got him in their sights but was refused permission to shoot. I think at that point from what the crowd were shouting they had spotted a man on the roof but not a gun. Would the police sniper be allowed to shoot a potentially unarmed man? What if he’d climbed up there for a good view and had his head blown off?

but maybe they should have bundled Trump off the stage while ascertaining that? But I can imagine if it turned out to be an innocent spectator Trump would have been furious for the over reaction. Of course ideally they should have secured all possible vantage points better and seen him much much earlier. He left his bloody ladder propped up against the wall!

Yes, there was a supermarket shooting which was stopped by a bystander a few years ago. I’m sure there will have been more.

edited, was a mall apnews.com/article/shootings-indiana-indianapolis-gun-politics-8b49655e3737c1924480e1039405a196 apnews.com/article/shootings-indiana-indianapolis-gun-politics-8b49655e3737c1924480e1039405a196]]]]

I’ve watched the videos and can hand on heart say that I don’t think the men appear to confused. Yes it was a chaotic scene but the men and a few of the women appeared to be in control of the situation. The examples I’ve given were clearly not.

Why everyone’s focused on them… it’s not hard to figure out. People are angry and looking for someone to blame. Sadly these women are front and center in the spotlight.

The women looked good to me and were not cowering - far from it. One of them had her head on Trump’s heart and it looks like he whacks her in the face when doing his fist pump thing. The other two were focused on protecting the car.

#cormorantstrikesback

That was interesting, thank you. Lifted this from the article.

It isn’t common for mass shootings to be stopped in such fashion. From 2000 to 2021, fewer than 3% of 433 active attacks in the U.S. ended with a civilian firing back, according to the Advanced Law Enforcement Rapid Response Training Center

😂 I met a few Secret Service guys probably about 20 years ago. They were, in fact, actual Secret Service, not just some idiot who made that up to be Mister Big Dick. My friend used to work for Bill Clinton and she knew them through work. They had a big event and at the close of the week, the guys were off duty and she invited them out for drinks with us.

They were an absolute hot f-ing mess. One knocked a tooth out doing shots. The other fell down the stairs to the toilets. We (as in my friend and I, two 20 something women) had to actually put them in a taxi and pray they made it back to their hotel. I always used to laugh thinking of that night because if that’s what’s guarding all of America’s presidents, god help them.

You should see our military off duty 🤣

Thanks for the visual, totally doesn’t surprise me. Work hard/play hard!

As heartwarming as that thought is, she's actually picking up his hat. The one that was cowering is also the one that couldn't holster her gun.

They need to have women in the teams, not least because there will be women who require protection (both by holding senior qualifying positions themselves, or by being the wife or daughter of the most V of VIPs)

And those women need to be deployed regularly to keep their skills up to scratch.

But they do need to be pretty rigorous about deployment choices - and having a woman a whole head shorter then the protected person (as it appeared from at least some Trump photos) does seem an unusual choice. And I suspect, from the version I read, that the person speaking was having a pop about internal departmental politicking about who gets exactly what role on the day, rather than a blanket comment about whether women should serve in these roles at all.

Would the police sniper be allowed to shoot a potentially unarmed man?

I thought this was their speciality?

Well quite. Obviously it happens. And I assume normal police should be trained to only shoot someone if there is a threat to life.

Are secret service trained that a person on a roof not doing anything is enough of a threat to blow their heads off without any other indication?

Well god help him RFK Jr. was just granted secret service protection after Trump asked for it.

Although I wouldn’t be so quick to give up the private security if I were him… If Trump is getting the “B” squad he’ll certainly be assigned the “C” squad

I don’t know. The man who spoke to the BBC correspondent said he could clearly see a rifle, I don’t know if others who tried to tell the police were able to as well.

If the choice is being manhandled with risk of injury, or or being left exposed to the risk of death, they'll go for the manhandling every time.

If you ever find yourself caught up in a security incident and the specialists have to come in to rescue you, do exactly what they tell you, and realise that they're more interested in getting you out alive than whether you get any eg broken bones on the unorthodox way out

You know a woman who is 6’11”? Hardly going to be ten a penny are they?

So why is she in the job then??

No , she is a bit of an outlier for sure. My stepdaughter used to date a lad who was 6ft 7in and this woman was way taller. She and the bf were pushing a buggy too. Of course there are many variables and the child might end up as a relatively tiny six footer.