we're funded by these television companies and more. including charter communications. >> charter is proud to be recognized as one of the best internet providers. and we're just getting started. building 100,000 miles of new infrastructure to reach those who need it most. >> charter communications supports c-span as a public servic along with these other television providers. giving you a front row seat to democracy. host: bloomberg govert reporter ellen gilmer joins us now with the ongoing investigations into the assassination attempt on donald trump. between the secret service, the fbi, start off with an overview on who is investigating what aspect of this right now? guest: it's a huge landscape of

an investigation and the fbi is investigating the actual shooter's motive. the secret service is investigating itself, what went wrong. they call it mission assurance review, how to make sure this doesn't happen again. president biden ordered an independent review, it is being done by a former secretary under obama, janet napolitano, and it has had officials from both sides of the aisle. and then congress is doing its thing with bipartisan task forces and those are probably the biggest ones. host: which one should we pay the most attention to and which ones are you paying the most attention to? guest: i'm closely tracking the independent review ordered by the president and we will start to see results from that later this month. a lot of people, the

assassination attempt happened in july, a lot of people have had it swept into the news cycle, but it will start to be a big issue again as we start to see recommendations from this group of experts. and then the task force in the house is gearing up to do all of its work and will have results in september. host: what's the biggest question we are waiting for and what results have we already gotten? guest: there are countless questions. some of the biggest findings so far include that they didn't have proper -- they call it over, someone keeping an eye on the high points of view. a direct line of sight to the former president, including the roof, obviously, that the shooter shot from. they did not have that properly covered. they didn't have a drone in the air to look at that. they didn't have a nearby water tower covered. there are some pretty obvious

failures in the security plan. and that reliance on local law enforcement officials without the proper kind of communication channel set up. they didn't have interoperability and they were not connected by radio, they were not in the loop with the other officials helping. host: why? guest: great question. i think we will start to learn more about that as the investigation plays out. some people say it's poor planning. others say it's a matter of funding and a lack of resources. interoperability, radio systems, it's a long-standing issue for law enforcement. this happens all the time when you have agencies and at different departments working together under these systems, but it can be done more smoothly than it was, so the question is why did they plan so poorly? why didn't they get everyone in the same control room, for example. the question of funding will

continue to play out in congress as well. host: shooter motives, what do we know at this point? guest: not a lot. in terms of social media accounts, ideologies are not super clear, not partisan, generally opposed to people in power and wanting to make a mark. host: you talked about this a little bit, but the timeframe of how long these investigations will take and when we expect answers. what are they telling you? guest: independent review, later in the month about the overarching thing. bipartisan task force in the house, the december 13 is the deadline. they had just been on recess and they are taking another month-long recess in october to campaign for november. that is going to be tight. they are kicking off with -- they have already done some work and are likely doing a public hearing at the end of host: this month. host:where will that take place?

guest: on the hill, in the house. the special task force was established in july after the assassination attempt by unanimous vote. it's got real bipartisan backing . in the house they will likely do more hearings, somehow squeeze them in in november after the election before they release the report in december. host: several weeks ago, the secret service director, kimberly cheadle resigns, richard ronald rowe becomes acting director. what else has changed in the secret service? guest: ronald rowe was the deputy director when it all happened, it's not like he's new to the scene. he was kim cheadle's deputy. they have tried to focus more on transparency. one of the biggest complaints in the week following the shooting was the lack of answers from the secret service, who didn't even

participate in the day of press briefing that the local law enforcement and fbi did. that's something they are trying to get out there more. they did one last month. we will see if that continues to be the case. they are trying to be really public. they also made changes in how they work with local law enforcement. security plans now have to be approved by different levels of supervisor and are subject to more oversight. host: here are your phone numbers. (202) 748-8000, democrats. (202) 748-8001, republicans. independents, (202) 748-8002. ellen gilmer is our guest, talking about these various investigations. if you have questions about where these are, start calling in. taking viewers back to late july, ronald rowe testified about the shooting. a bit of a tense exchange.

i will let you fill in the details. [video clip] >> you knew you had a security situation in the person who has sent to trump on stage, have they been released? >> no. >> when you knew that the locals were working serious security, that person who knew that, have they been relieved of duty? >> sir, i refer you back to my original answer that we are investigating this on mission assurance -- >> what more do you need to investigate to know that there were critical enough failures that some individuals ought to be held accountable? what more do you need to know? >> exactly what happened and i need my investigators to do their job. >> people didn't do their job. >> i cannot put my thumb on the scale. >> what do you mean? >> you are asking me to make a rush to judgment about somebody failing. i acknowledge --

>> is it not prima facie that someone failed? >> school, this could have been a texas school book depository. i have lost sleep over that for the past 17 days. >> then fire someone who will be held accountable. >> i will not rush to judgment and people will be held accountable. i will do so with integrity and not rush to judgment. >> i can't believe that you are -- >> unfairly persecuted. >> people are dead. >> we have to be able to have a proper investigation into this. >> earlier you said there had to be protocols followed and unless there was a protocol violation, people would not be disciplined. i think that if your protocols don't provide for the fact that a former president is shot, when an american is killed, when other rally-goer's are shot at and critically wounded, if that isn't a protocol violation, revise your protocols.

>> this is where you and i agree. it was a failure and we will get to the bottom of it. host: that was five weeks ago. explain what's happening there and what has happened since. guest: the acting director is explaining that they haven't yet relieved people of their jobs because of what happened to because there is a whole process for many government employees, or at any company, there's a whole process where they have to investigate what happened and who messed up. since then, some people have been placed on administrative duties. does it mean that the investigation has concluded or that the outcome of their investigation has concluded, they are no longer on the front lines. host: pulled off of active cases. guest: not protecting the president, former president, or any protect these. host: how did congress feel

about ronald rowe writ large? guest: people have more confidence in him because he struck this tone. that was obviously a tense exchange and you will see a lot of that, but it's nowhere nearly as contentious as the house oversight hearing with former director kimberly cheadle. that was just hostile the entire time. host: books being dropped, as i recall. guest: exactly. member saying she needs to resign and she did so the next day. they are more willing to give ronald rowe a chance, but they will become more contentious with him as well if he comes back to the hill this fall. host: ellen gilmer is our guest, of bluebird. this is alex, d.c., republican, you're up first. go ahead. caller: background on me, i used to work for the federal government, i left, i wanted to give some insight into what i

think is going on here. the biggest thing is that the federal government that's a lot of money, make mistakes, then they come back and ask for more money and congress gives them money. there is never pressure to improve the processes. what we need to have happen is two things, congress [indiscernible] when things don't go well or the executive branch breaks the investigations. two, we need the media to take a much more scrutinizing look at the executive branch. a lot of the failures lately have been failures of the executive branch. be it afghanistan, this assassination, the biden stuff -- you can go through and know that there were a lot of things that were known in terms of corruption. that's all the public information. host: alex, what agency did you work for? caller: department of defense. guest: why did you leave?

caller: i wanted to serve the country and it felt dishonest. there are a lot of good people working there, but the higher you go, the more politicized it gets. if you don't want something to work, you put bad people to it, the money never appears. congress doesn't understand. what they understand is that they have five minutes on television and they might channel some frustration and the reason they won't change is they will not withhold money. there has to be pressure for performance from congress on top level people. the people underneath can be pushed around anywhere they want. host: what do you do now? caller: i work for a think tank here. they would probably never take me, but i think that things work -- i hope that things work out in the country gets the leadership and people deserve.

these are challenges and in a lot of cases, either if it's from here or from china, they are not being assessed at all. guest: i think the questions about funding are compelling. secret service has funding of $3 billion, higher than it has ever been. there are a ton of agencies that are chronically underfunded. i don't know that the secret service would be considered one of them. have asked for more money for certain things. they have senate appropriators asking a lot of these questions that were brought up by the caller, including how exactly are you using the money that we have been giving you. these increases, are you using it effectively? arguably, not. if it includes not having drones, counter drones, technology and use during the campaign rally would have been helpful in identifying the shooter's activities beforehand.

you will see that battle play out on capitol hill. today, this week, it's pretty high-stakes before a potential government shutdown. we will see a lot of arguments continuing to go. host: you covered congress for a long time. what did you think of that description of an agency that screws up and comes to congress to say that we need more money to not screw up again and congress just throws money at the problem? guest: it's very typical for the agency to come to congress and say i need more money to make sure never happens again. i wouldn't say that congress necessarily always throws more money at them. often they focus on the questions the appropriators and secret service have been asking, digging in on those details. you might see a fairly thoughtful attempt to respond to funding needs this time around.

host: to that point, the interaction between republicans and democrats, not politicizing assassination attempts, how has that happened? what have you seen and observed as members have worked together? guest: earlier we talked about the bipartisan task force in the house with a unanimous vote from everyone there that day, that doesn't happen a lot. it says a lot about the mandate to do things in a nonpartisan way. we will see who -- how that plays out. the people they chose our lawmakers with experience in national security, intelligence, people bringing a lot of experience to bear. but there are some questionable members of the task force. you will see things that heated sometimes and you will see members disagree, but at the end of the day, the question is, when they predict a report or whenever they produce findings

or recommendations, is seen as solid, trustworthy, reliable, something everyone wants to act on, or is it per trade as a partisan exercise undermined by arguments that it is partisan? host: why are some members trying to launch their own investigation outside the task force? guest: the task force was to consolidate the investigations that had already started, but we are seeing numbers -- eli crane, matt gaetz, andy biggs, others have worked together to pursue their own line of inquiry and are relying largely on whistleblower accounts. they are clearly, you know, doing their own investigation. the task force is designed to be doing all the work. they are clearly not in step with the plan but at this point they are also trying not to be too adversarial about it. i spoke to some members about the alternative investigation a few weeks ago and they said they

view it as complementary. they are not criticizing the work of the task force. let's see how that plays out. host: do we know if they are pursuing fundamentally different lines of question or evidence? are they doing it because the task force is in asking the right questions? guest: i think it's more of a protective measure. they are worried that the task force will pass the right questions or won't take seriously enough alternative views. i spoke to some task force members about how they are handling these conspiracy theories and they said -- look, our goal is to be all open to alternative views without going down a rabbit hole. that's open to interpretation. the other investigations host: are likely addressing that. democratic line, florida, you are on with ellen gilmer caller: good morning.

an investigation into an assassination is entirely appropriate, whenever they get around to doing it. my congressman, byron donalds, had a meeting i guess back in august and i was going to go down and ask him this question that i will ask you now. i did make it down, maybe you can ask ellen. in the summer of 2023, the fbi came to mar-a-lago to retrieve documents that the ex-president would not return in didn't belong to him. earlier this summer, 2024, the ex-president made the outrageous claim that they had come there to assassinate him. so my question is, which would have been for mr. donald as well , why don't they investigate that? here you have the ex-president saying the fbi or other federal law-enforcement agencies came to

his residence in florida to assassinate him. ok? he's made the claim. he's the ex-president. why won't they investigate that? guest: clearly there are plenty of investigations going on into the actions of the former president, but as far as investigating his rhetoric on something like that, that's not something any federal agency will spend time on. you could argue that maybe they should, but that's not the case that they want to investigate any remark that might be seen as inflammatory or misleading. host: did donald trump sit down for an interview with the fbi about the assassination attempt? i forget. guest: i don't believe that has happened. host: so, what's his relationship with the fbi and christopher wray right now? do they have much interaction? host: that's a great question.

the fbi and chris wray have had a contentious relationship with donald trump and with a lot of congressional republicans recently, congressional republicans saying that the fbi has been weaponized. that could come to bear to some extent in these investigations. i would say that in the immediate days following the assassination attempt, we weren't working on anything like that. from the trump campaign they weren't ready to cooperate, figure out the facts and keep everyone safe. host: decatur, illinois, independent, good morning. caller: good morning. as the bullet ever been recovered? the bullet that was fired at mr. trump? guest: yeah, they have completely investigated the entire crime scene. the fbi confirmed that the former president was hit by either the bullet itself or pieces of the bullet and they

did that through ballistics analysis and looking at the scene. host: i know that there were reports that trump would sit down for a victim interview and i didn't know if that had happened. guest: i haven't heard of that happening. host: alabama, democratic line. what's the pronunciation? iknell? caller: yes, i wanted to ask a question about former president trump, got shot. a black man carried a white lady across the stage, had blood on his shirt. he passed her to a security guard. and then when they was helping trump off the stage, it was one of the secret service ladies, she pulled a gun out, pistol out

real quick, then put it back in. but, what was all that about? the next thing, the man that got killed -- two got killed, the shooter and another man, did they do autopsies to see what did it? host: you are asking if they did autopsies? caller: yes. guest: i don't know the particulars about the scene you are describing at the beginning of your question. as far as autopsies go, i don't know the particulars of autopsies on the bystander. they did autopsy the shooter's body. the coroner has released a body to the family and it has been cremated, and outcome that has raised some questions, some lawmakers thought it was too quick for a situation where

there were so many questions. host: back to the secret service, it was 2003 when the secret service and the department of homeland security from treasury, has there been any discussion about reorganizing the secret service, but their mission is and should be in the wake of what happened in july? guest: yes. it was established in 2003 in the aftermath of 9/11, a massive reorganization of government with a lot of agencies coming together at a lot of them have been wishing they could leave ever since. host: why? guest: new department, growing pains. 20 years old now but that is still relatively new. a lot of public scrutiny and unpopular work. when you think about the mission, border security, tsa, counterterrorism, it's sticky stuff and they often get a lot

of public scrutiny. agencies that used to be -- the secret service use to be in the treasury department, back to their legacy work combating counterfeiting and they still do do financial work. in treasury, they were kind of big shots, secret service, within the department of treasury. in the department of homeland security they are one of many, one of many law enforcement units within the department. some former agents i have spoken to said that this is the time that we move secret service back to treasury or out of dhs, put it by itself, put it somewhere else, because they think it is getting lost within the department, there are too many competing missions and needs within the department and the service doesn't get the priorities they think they need. host: do they still do financial

crimes even though they are outside of the treasury department? guest: it's a legacy. they have been doing it for over a century and they are good at it. this is where a lot of the agents learn investigative skills, doing financial crimes, investigating people now in terms of protecting public officials and the president. host: we got less than 20 minutes left in our discussion with ellen gilmer about the assassination attempt on donald trump. we will be heading over to the university of chicago this morning for a discussion on pandemic with administration officials and other experts there. so, we will be joining that discussion when we end this program. if you stick around on c-span, that is where you will go. the house is coming in at noon, the senate is in at 3 p.m., c-span and c-span two, gavel-to-gavel. thomas, houston, independent,

good morning. caller: how you doing, america? listen, as far as the secret service, it goes back decades with scandals, even under the bush administration it was sex parties and cocaine parties and all that, but i'm not here to say all of that. after the incident report on the trump shooting, did he go to the hospital? what was the outcome? i have shot those type of weapons and they do a heck of a lot more damage, believe me. the guy who was killed, how is that family doing? and where did the kid get the weapon? it's kind of hard to stop anyone when you have all of these people out there that are trump supporters. i mean, thousands of them. open carry state, red caps.

who do you stop? guest: pretty much every question he raised is something they are looking at in the investigation. as far as the injury to the former president, the fbi has confirmed over and over that he was hit by a bullet. so, clearly, you know, it wasn't a super direct hit. he turned his head, that was very lucky, but he was hit by a bullet according to the fbi. as far as the other questions, they are looking into a lot of those in the investigation. the open carry question that you raised, that is something that democrats have been raising on the hill. access to guns in america, the proliferation of guns in america , they have tried to corner and press officials to say in a public forum -- is this making it harder for them to do your job.

we have seen enforcement officials kind of skirt the question and say they don't want to get into this kind of political debate and that their job is to deal with the threat environment as it exists. host: the caller alluded to past secret service scandals. did you read the book about the rise and fall of the secret service? guest: absolutely, carol's book is a must read for anyone interested in the secret service, it details a lot of their scandals and failures in the past. even just a couple of years ago there were a lot of text related to january 6 and how they protected people that day, a lot of those messages were deleted and never recovered. that was a big deal a couple of years ago. talking about all of these investigations that are happening, after some fence jumpers during the obama and trump administration's, the scandals in columbia during the

advanced trip, all kinds of big issues that put the agency in the public eye and not in a good way, there have been these big reviews done and there was a bloomberg report after a few of the scandals doing the obama years and a lot of the recommendations of the panel, again, like a panel of experts, former officials with expertise in the area, a lot of it was never carried out. whether it was resources or the agency didn't think it was practical, that's what we face now, how much of this will result in actual change? host: that book came out in 2021 and we covered it with her at the tucson festival of books in 2000 22, march of 2022, and if you want to watch it you can watch it online, there it is for viewers, c-span.org in our video archive, discussing exactly what you were discussing this

morning. this is peter, milwaukee, wisconsin, independent. good morning. guest: good morning. i will be honest with you guys, in our open company we took a polling on the trump shooting. you can be union or nonunion and it is almost 99% even. host: what was the poll question? caller: a lot of people here said that the shooter should have practiced better. host: all right, apologize for that. stepping away from the assassination attempt investigation, what are we looking for in terms of coverage over the next couple of weeks? there's a potential shutdown happening on september 30. we talked about it earlier. what is your read on whether the government shuts down at the end of the month? guest: they proba