Pennsylvania House Republicans introduce legislation to investigate assassination attempt

More questions than answers remain after the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump in Butler County. Now, Pennsylvania state leaders are getting involved.

“We really believe this should be non-political, this is giving voice to state and local law enforcement to discuss what happened during a national tragedy,” said Jason Gottesman, spokesperson for the PA House Republican Caucus.

>> Trump injured in assassination attempt at rally in Butler; 1 attendee, suspected shooter killed

Less than a week after the former president was grazed by a bullet in a shooting that killed a former fire chief and wounded two others, State House Republican Bryan Cutler wants to create a committee to find out what happened from the local and state perspective.

A new photo obtained by Channel 11 shows the gunman, Thomas Crooks at 5:14 p.m. Saturday, nearly an hour before the shooting and roughly 30 minutes before a photo shared with us earlier in the week.

>> Trump rally gunman spotted by law enforcement nearly 30 minutes before shots fired, sources say

At 5:41 p.m., local police called into command with a description of Crooks acting suspiciously.

At 6:05 p.m., Trump was taking the podium and local police again saw Crooks with a backpack on, heading around the back of the AGR building.

“Leader Cutler believes it’s imperative we found out what happened from state and local law enforcement, give them a voice to tell us what happened from their perspective plus improve practices of state and local law enforcement,” Gottesman said.

Pennsylvania is a battleground state for November and this will not be the last campaign rally. The goal is for the Committee to have three Republicans and three Democrats. While it will be up to the members if conversations happen behind closed doors or publicly, a report is due by the end of November to the entire General Assembly.

>> Local, national officials condemn violence following shooting at Trump rally

“We aren’t due back until late September but we certainly would be open to House Democrats seeing this as a high priority and moving more quickly than that, so ultimately it’s up to them on how quickly they want to schedule things and move things,” Gottesman said.

Channel 11 did reach out to the House Democratic Caucus to get those answers on when we may see this Committee formed as they could chair it, but have not heard back.

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