(page 10)
HSGAC Majority: I also work for Chairman Peters. And just as starting point if you could maybe give us a really brief high-level overview of your role and responsibilities with respect to the July 13th rally at Butler.
Witness: Sure. I was assigned as the command post/slash security room agent.
(…)
(page 16)
And then talking about July 13th specifically, could you give us a sense of the chain of command on that day from your point of view, who, if anyone, you reported to on that day?
Witness: Sure. I reported to the site agent.
HSGAC Majority: To the site agent?
Witness: Yes.
(…)
(page 25)
HSGAC Majority: And who do you know who was responsible for making the decisions about the location of the event and what equipment would be there?
Witness: Typically, that would be the site agent.
HSGAC Majority: And did you have any conversations with the site agent prior to the 13th about the setup in the room?
Witness: About the setup in the room? No.
(…)
(page 30)
Witness: So, it was a very, very busy site. I think in earlier testimony, I‘ve said it was one of the busier sites I‘ve ever worked from a command post perspective, the amount of traffic that was coming through it.
(…)
And there was a constant flow of dispatch of medical personnel to people who were, you know, having issues in the crowd. Throughout the day, we had two or three lost children, one of whom actually spent some time in the command post and security room until they were reunited with their family. We had lost property coming into the command post and security room. We had a call about a media truck that was going to set the ground on fire. So, we had to figure out how to get fire trucks to that. (…)
HSGAC Majority: Got it. Can you talk a little bit about just the physical setup of the room, how big it was?
Witness: Sure. It was a relatively large room, kind of in a standalone building. And there were essentially card tables or tables of about this size. You know, the six-foot, eight-foot tables set up in a big ring configuration. That was pretty much it. There was one door out the front, and then there were two small windows to my right. And there was a little kitchen in the back and a restroom.
(…)
(page 33)
I had to enlist the help of the Butler Farm Show personnel there to find me an extension cord and a power strip. So, I set up my radio so I could at least look out the door of the command post.
(…)
The security room also functioned as the — what we would call the down room. when the agents were getting relief from their post, it‘s where they would come. The site agents were in and out of the room throughout the day. The PI response and the counter sniper, CS Response Teams, were in and out of the room all day.
Other Pennsylvania State Troopers who were doing the same thing, who were being pushed, were in and out of the room all day. Our Uniformed Division personnel who were working the magnetometers who were on break, in and out of the room all day. And then at one point the agent assigned to work the UAS detection system, ended up taking up residence and setting up his station in the security room
(…)
(page 55)
HSGAC Majority: But the first person on the chain would‘ve been the site agent?
Witness: Correct.
HSGAC Majority: You mentioned in preparation the written materials were the only mention you saw of the setup that day. And correct me if I‘m wrong, but I believe you said it, reference commmand post or security room, but in this case, both?
Witness: Correct. So for this particular visit, the command post and the site security room for the Butler Farm Show were one and the same.
(…)
HSGAC Minority: I guess, let‘s start first with the man on the roof. Well, I mean at that time you didn’t know about it, so.
Witness: So the Man on the roof thing, again, I never heard the man on the roof thing because I believe if the claim is that that was said out loud into the room, that that was probably occurring as I‘m getting the same traffic of the local police are working a problem at 3 o‘clock, which I‘m listening to my Secret Service radio intently at that point.
HSGAC Minority: And are you only listening to your Secret?
Witness: Well, I‘m trying to listen to as much as I can, but I typically can only listen to one thing at a time.
HSGAC Minority: Do you recall, I guess, the level of activity that was going on around that time, around 6:09
Witness: Precisely at 6:09, no. But I will say that at the time that the call came across that the local police were working a problem at the 3 o‘clock, that the entire — everybody who was in the security room definitely peaked up and was very much turned on.
HSGAC Minority: So, is it that the locals were working something at the 3 o‘clock that raised it to enough of a threat level that you felt like you needed to communicate that out on the radio?
Witness: Yeah. I reported back what I heard on the radio that came across on the Secret Service radio from another Secret Service personnel. And to this day, I‘m still not sure exactly who that was, who called that into the security room. But I‘m listening for traffic on my Secret Service radio.
Witness Counsel: Can I just say that when you used the phrase „enough of a threat,“ there were between a suspicion and a threat, those are mutually exclusive categories and they have completely different meanings. If you wanted to expound on your understanding of the difference between a suspicion and a threat?
Witness: Sure. A threat is somebody who has the capability to do immediate harm to somebody. So even in this instance, even if I had heard that there was a man on a roof, a man on a roof solely that is not necessarily a threat.