Cong. Hill wants answers from Secret Service, Trump advance team

U.S. Rep. French Hill, R-Little Rock, has concerns about the recent assassination attempt on GOP Presidential nominee, former President Donald Trump.

In an interview with Talk Business & Politics, Hill, who has worked on Presidential advance teams, said Congress will be diving into conversations and hearings to learn more about how a lone shooter was able to get less than two football fields away from a major Presidential candidate with a high-powered rifle.

“I do have concerns about the setup and I talked to Speaker Mike Johnson. I’ve been in and around presidential advance since 1984. And to have the cutaway shot on a presidential candidate was dumbfounding to me,” Hill said.

“My questions are for the Trump campaign advance staff and Secret Service. Tell me about the process they went through. There’s no way a person on top of a building, a hundred thirty five, a hundred forty yards away should have a clear shot at that dais,” he said. “I really think it was a violation of Advance 101 on part of the Secret Service and the Trump campaign advance. Those two work seamlessly together. And so we have already asked the Secret Service for briefings. We’ve asked the FBI for briefings about the shooter, and I know [Speaker] Mike Johnson will be on top of this on behalf of Congress.”

Hill sees Trump’s selection of Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance as a move for youth and midwestern voter appeal. He predicts Vance, who is a first-term U.S. Senator like former President Barack Obama was, will be an asset in key swing states.

“I think Trump will put him on that campaign trail in Ohio and Pennsylvania, two swing states, with his message. I think he’ll be in Michigan and Wisconsin too. I think that’s what he brings to the the ticket,” Hill noted.

“Is he the best choice? I don’t know. I think there were people that had more seasoning like a Glenn Youngkin, governor of Virginia, even Nikki Haley, who was the second best vote getter in the Republican primary. She’s a two-term governor of South Carolina, our ambassador to the United Nations. But this is a decision that President Trump has to make both from a campaign point of view and it is his choice,” he added.

If Trump is re-elected, he has announced plans to aggressively use tariffs in international trade relations. Hill, a former U.S. Treasury monetary policy expert, warned that tariffs must used in a particular manner to be effective.

“I think tariffs are a good stick to try to bring people to the negotiating table. President Trump used tariffs with both Japan, China, and Mexico in his first term to initiate and get people to the negotiating table,” he said. “I think Trump sees these as cudgels to get people to fair trade and open markets for American goods. But if they’re taken to an extreme and they’re put in across the board, they are inflationary, they are attacks on American consumers. That’s why I don’t really go for across the board. I didn’t like in his first term the across the board steel and aluminum tariffs. I thought they just raised costs for inputs on automobiles and other other things, and they dislocated workers here in the U.S.

“But I watched during the Reagan administration and Bush 41 administration using the threat to get markets opening. I think that’s at the core of what President Trump wants is fair trade and market opening… I think in Congress, I think a lot of people agree with my position that they’re a good cudgel, but they shouldn’t be used across the board because they are inflationary.”

Hill shared his thoughts on immigration reforms and abortion policy in the interview. You can watch the full interview in the video below.