Politics
BREAKING: Trump’s Plane Forced To Make Emergency Landing
Former President Donald Trump’s plane was forced to make an emergency landing in Billings, Montana on Friday due to a mechanical issue. The plane was headed to the Bozeman Airport where Trump is holding a rally when it was forced to change course. The Republican leader is now expected to take a private plane to Bozeman so he is able to make the rally on time.
WATCH:
JUST IN: Donald Trump's plane was forced to make an emergency landing in Billings, Montana due to a mechanical issue.
The plane was headed to the Bozeman Airport where Trump is holding a rally when it was forced to change course.
Trump is now expected to take a private… pic.twitter.com/I0xm7BNWYv
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) August 9, 2024
Local news station KTVH reports:
The plane of former president and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump landed in Billings, Montana Friday afternoon.
Photos and video sent in by a viewer show the plane landing and taxied on the runway.
According to the Billings Airport, Trump’s plane landed in Billings after a mechanical issue. He is expected to take a private plane now to the Bozeman Airport. Secret Service is doing a complete sweep of the airport here before that takes place.
The safety and security of Trump has been at the top of mind for many Americans after the harrowing assassination attempt he barely escaped on July 13.
In July, Former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle tendered her resignation one day after an incendiary congressional hearing marked by accusations of dereliction and her mea culpa for allowing an attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
Cheatle previously declined to resign in an interview she gave just days after Trump was struck by a bullet while speaking at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. The shooting nearly became a constitutional crisis and prompted a reckoning among lawmakers about the state of today’s political dialogue as well as bipartisan calls for increased security around presidential candidates.
The steady drip of revelations about how the Secret Service handled Trump’s presidential campaign may ultimately have contributed to Cheatle’s departure. Last week major outlets reported that the service declined previous requests to staff Trump following death threats he had received, and in a hearing in July, Cheatle attempted to deflect when challenged to state how many requests she had denied.
Instead, the director told Congressman Jim Jordan (R-OH) that the Secret Service often relied on partnerships with local law enforcement to fill gaps in its coverage, especially during election years. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) was the first to report that the Secret Service had staffed President Trump with personnel who were not trained agents.
Earlier last month, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) claimed to have produced evidence from an agency whistleblower showing that the Secret Service assigned three “post” officers to Trump’s Butler, Pennsylvania rally on July 13, or additional detail members responsible for securing a certain segment of the perimeter. In contrast, Jill Biden’s visit to Pittsburgh drew 12 post officers. The disclosure was uncovered as part of Sen. Grassley’s investigation into correspondence within the Secret Service about how to staff both Trump and Jill Biden, who were just 33 miles apart that day.
Specifically under investigation is how the Secret Service partnered with law enforcement organizations in and around Butler to establish a protective presence along the perimeter of the rally. Cheatle and a spokesman for the Secret Service both claimed that the area was under guard by local authorities but said during the hearing that the building where the gunman fired from was outside that zone, contradicting previous findings. Lawmakers are also seeking to understand why the Secret Service determined that an agent could not be placed on the roof of the building due to its sloped incline, which Cheatle said would have disrupted an agent’s ability to monitor Trump.