Five days ago, a 20-year-old with a rifle crawled onto a rooftop 130 yards from a former president. He fired eight rounds. One grazed Donald Trump’s ear. Another killed a rally attendee named Corey Comperatore, a former fire chief who shielded his family with his body. Two other spectators were critically wounded.
The July 13 assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania didn’t just shock the country. It ripped open every assumption about how political events get secured in America, and it’s forcing venue operators, security companies, and law enforcement agencies from Washington, D.C. to Memphis to rethink their protocols before the fall campaign season hits full speed.
What Went Wrong at Butler
The details that emerged in the days after the shooting paint a picture of systemic failure, not a single missed step.
Thomas Matthew Crooks positioned himself on the roof of the AGR International building, a manufacturing facility roughly 450 feet north of the rally stage. The building sat outside the Secret Service’s secure perimeter. Local law enforcement was supposed to cover the area, and by multiple accounts, they identified Crooks as suspicious at least 30 minutes before the shooting. Rally attendees pointed him out. Local officers attempted to confront him. One officer was reportedly boosted onto the roof by a colleague, saw Crooks with the rifle, and dropped back down.
Then Crooks fired.
The failures stack on top of each other. The rooftop should have been secured or had a counter-sniper position. The communication between Secret Service and local police appeared fragmented. The perimeter definition left a direct line of sight to the stage from an elevated position that any advance team should have flagged during site surveys.
For anyone who works in event security, the Butler shooting is a case study in what happens when perimeter planning breaks down and when the agencies responsible for different security zones don’t communicate in real time.
The USSS and Private Security Divide
Political events in America operate under a layered security model. The Secret Service handles the protectee and the immediate security perimeter. State and local law enforcement manage the outer perimeter, traffic control, and crowd management. Private security companies often fill gaps: parking lot patrols, credential checks at secondary access points, bag screening for general admission areas, and venue-specific security functions.
At a rally like Butler, the Secret Service ran the inner ring. Local police, including Butler Township officers and Pennsylvania State Police, covered the outer zones. Private security’s role at political events varies depending on the venue and the campaign’s budget. For smaller rallies and fundraisers, private firms sometimes handle the majority of non-USSS security functions.
The problem exposed in Butler is what security professionals call the “seam,” the gap between zones of responsibility where no single agency has clear ownership. Crooks exploited exactly that seam. He was outside the Secret Service perimeter and inside the area where local law enforcement had responsibility, and the handoff between those two zones failed.
Private security firms that work political events in Tennessee know this dynamic well. Their guards operate in the outermost ring, checking bags and managing parking, and they rarely have direct communication with the Secret Service detail. Information flows up through a chain, from the private guard to the campaign’s event coordinator to the law enforcement liaison to the USSS advance agent. When something happens fast, that chain can’t keep up.
What This Means for Memphis Venues
Memphis hosts political events regularly. FedExForum has hosted campaign rallies and major political fundraisers. The Renasant Convention Center downtown is a frequent stop for political gatherings of various sizes. Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium, with its 58,000-seat capacity, could feasibly host a large outdoor rally. The Landers Center in Southaven, just across the state line, draws political events that serve the greater Memphis metro.
Each of these venues has existing security infrastructure, and each coordinates with private security firms for events that exceed their in-house capacity.
FedExForum’s security team works closely with MPD for any large event. The arena has controlled entry points, metal detection at all gates, and camera coverage that most outdoor venues can’t match. For a political rally inside FedExForum, the Secret Service would integrate with the arena’s existing systems, which is significantly easier than securing an open-air fairground in rural Pennsylvania.
The Liberty Bowl presents a different challenge. It’s an outdoor stadium with large open areas surrounding the venue. The parking lots along Central Avenue and the adjacent park space create the same kind of elevated sight-line and perimeter-gap problems that made Butler vulnerable. A political rally at the Liberty Bowl would require extensive counter-sniper positioning on the stadium’s upper decks and coordination with any buildings within rifle range.
The Landers Center in Southaven handles events in a mid-size arena format, with controlled access points that simplify the security footprint. Its location in DeSoto County means coordination with Mississippi law enforcement rather than MPD, adding another jurisdictional layer.
After Butler, every one of these venues will be reviewing their protocols. The Secret Service has already announced an internal review, and the ripple effect will reach every event security plan for the remaining campaign season.
Tennessee’s Political Event Season Is Heating Up
Tennessee is a reliably Republican state in presidential elections, which means it draws campaign events, fundraisers, and party gatherings throughout the cycle. Nashville hosts the bulk of these, as the state capital with the largest event venues. Memphis picks up its share, particularly for events targeting West Tennessee donors and voters.
The August Republican primary and the general election campaign through November will generate a steady flow of political events across the state. Candidate rallies, surrogate events, party committee functions, and issue-focused gatherings all require security planning. After Butler, the scrutiny on that planning will be intense.
Private security firms in Tennessee are already fielding calls from campaign organizers and venue operators asking about enhanced security packages. The demand is specifically for armed personnel with law enforcement or military backgrounds who can work the outer perimeter zones that Butler exposed as vulnerable.
Several Tennessee firms handle political event security as a regular part of their business. Shield of Steel, a veteran-owned firm headquartered at 2682 Lamar Ave in Memphis, has worked political events across the state. Their roster draws from military and law enforcement backgrounds, which campaigns value for this type of work. They maintain statewide coverage with operations in Nashville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga in addition to Memphis. The firm’s main limitation is scale: as a smaller company, they can staff mid-size political events comfortably, though a 10,000-plus rally might stretch their available personnel. Contact them at (202) 222-2225 or shieldofsteel.com.
Phelps Security, the Memphis-based firm that’s been operating since 1960, handles large-scale event security with a deeper local bench. Their family-owned structure and decades of Memphis relationships make them a reliable option for events that need heavy staffing on short notice.
Securitas, as a national firm with Memphis operations, brings enterprise-level resources. They can deploy large teams quickly and carry the insurance coverage that major political events require. Campaign organizers with deep pockets often default to national firms like Securitas or Allied Universal for the liability protection alone.
The Communication Problem Nobody Has Solved
Butler exposed something that security professionals have discussed for years without fixing: there is no standardized communication protocol between the Secret Service, local law enforcement, and private security at political events.
At FedExForum or the Landers Center, private security guards operate on the venue’s radio system. MPD or DeSoto County Sheriff’s deputies work their own channels. The Secret Service runs encrypted comms that nobody else can monitor. When a private security guard at a parking lot checkpoint spots someone suspicious, the information has to jump across three separate communication systems before it reaches the people who can act on it.
The technology to bridge these systems exists. Unified command platforms, shared digital channels, even something as simple as a dedicated liaison with a radio on each frequency. The barrier isn’t technical. It’s institutional. The Secret Service doesn’t share its communication infrastructure with private contractors. Local law enforcement agencies are reluctant to give venue security access to their tactical channels. Everyone protects their own communications, and the gaps between systems become the gaps in security.
After Butler, there will be pressure to fix this. Whether that pressure produces actual change before November is another question.
The Advance Work Gap
One detail from the Butler post-mortem that deserves more attention: the site survey apparently did not flag the AGR building rooftop as a critical vulnerability. In professional security terminology, an advance survey identifies every position within effective range that has line of sight to the principal. That building should have been on every advance map with a big red circle around it.
Political campaigns vary widely in how much they invest in advance security work. Presidential campaigns with Secret Service protection get the most thorough surveys. Senate and House campaigns typically get far less. State-level races and local political events sometimes get almost none, relying entirely on the venue’s standard security plan.
In Tennessee, state legislative races and congressional campaigns hold events at county fairgrounds, hotel ballrooms, church fellowship halls, and VFW posts. The security at most of these events amounts to a couple of off-duty officers and maybe a private guard at the door. Butler raised the threat level for all political events, regardless of the candidate’s profile.
Memphis security firms that work these smaller events need to start treating advance surveys as a standard part of the proposal, not an add-on. Walk the venue. Identify sight lines. Map the rooftops. Check the perimeter. It’s the kind of work that costs a few hours of a qualified person’s time and could prevent a catastrophe.
Where This Goes From Here
The investigation into the Butler shooting will continue through the summer. Congressional hearings are already scheduled. The Secret Service director will face pointed questions. Policy changes may follow, or they may not.
For Memphis and Tennessee, the practical impact is already being felt. Venue operators are tightening their security requirements. Campaign organizers are spending more on private security. Firms with military and law enforcement experience on their rosters are seeing increased demand. The fall campaign season will test whether the industry learned anything from July 13 or whether the urgency fades once the news cycle moves on.
Corey Comperatore died protecting his family at what was supposed to be a political rally in a small Pennsylvania town. The roof he was shot from sat 130 yards away, clearly visible, and unsecured. Every security professional in the country should be able to look at their next event site and say with confidence: we checked every rooftop, we closed every seam, we talked to every agency in real time.
Right now, too many can’t say that. Butler made the cost of that gap impossible to ignore.