For Immediate Release
September 17, 2024
Contact: Taylor Haulsee
WASHINGTON — Tonight, following the second assassination attempt on President Trump’s life, Speaker Johnson announced that the House will expand the investigative purview of the Task Force to Investigate the Attempted Assassination of Donald Trump to include the second assassination attempt. Speaker Johnson was joined in delivering remarks off the House floor by Task Force Chairman Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania.
Below are Speaker Johnson’s full remarks announcing the change:
“I was with President Trump, I happened to be in Mar-a-Lago on Sunday immediately after the event and my wife and I visited with President Trump for about three hours. I’ll just say this, and I don’t think anybody can refute it: I don’t think there’s ever been a leader in the history of our country that’s been so aggressively attacked and has remained so resilient and strong.
“And he is still fighting for the American people and that’s the mantra. Fight, fight, fight, and that’s what he’s doing.
“We have a responsibility here in Congress to get down to the bottom of this, to figure out why these things are happening and what we can do about it.
“So, I’ve demanded of the White House today on the telephone and in writing that they provide President Trump with every available asset to ensure his protection.
“This is critically important for the White House to do, the buck stops at the President’s desk. We will see if they will do that.
“My demand has been, that President Trump should have the same exact level of protection as a sitting President, as President Biden has himself. He is under constant threat.
“He’s in the midst of a heated campaign, and this is an obvious thing that has now been proven that we need to do. In the meantime, Congress is going to do everything that we can to ensure that that happens. And one of the things we’re going to do is expand the scope of the existing task force to cover the second assassination attempt. And Chairman Mike Kelly’s been doing an extraordinary job on that.”
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