Two years after her husband was killed during the assassination attempt on President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, Helen Comperatore says her family is still waiting for a clear explanation of how the gunman was able to open fire despite warnings that a suspicious person had been seen near the rally grounds.
NewsNation investigative correspondent Rich McHugh spoke exclusively with Comperatore, whose husband, Corey Comperatore, died after shielding his wife and daughter from gunfire during the July 13, 2024, campaign event.
Corey, a 50-year-old volunteer fire chief and father of two, threw himself over his family when the shots began. He was struck and killed, while Trump was wounded and two other rally attendees were injured.
“Unfortunately, he got killed,” Helen said. “And I don’t want anybody to forget that.”
She told McHugh that she was looking into her husband’s eyes when he was shot and that the family continues to struggle because basic questions about the security breakdown and the gunman’s motive remain unanswered.
“We don’t have answers,” she said.
“There Should Never Have Been a First Shot”
Helen rejected suggestions that the assassination attempt had somehow been staged or exaggerated.
“None of this was fake,” she told McHugh. “It was not fake that day. President Trump got shot.”
Her frustration is rooted not only in the loss of her husband but in the belief that the attack should have been prevented before Thomas Matthew Crooks ever fired from the roof of a nearby building.
When McHugh asked what the Secret Service got most wrong that day, Helen answered with one word.
“Everything.”
She said authorities had received enough warning about a suspicious person that Trump should have been kept away from the stage until the situation was resolved.
“If they would have held him back off that stage, would not let him go, I wouldn’t be sitting here with you today,” she said.
That conclusion is painfully understandable. For the family, the security failures are not an abstract subject for hearings or reports; they are the reason an ordinary trip to a political rally ended with a husband and father dead.
Report Found Serious Communication Failures
McHugh pointed to a Department of Homeland Security report that found the Secret Service had failed to establish a joint communications room with local law enforcement.
Local officers had been receiving reports about Crooks before the shooting, but important information did not move effectively between the agencies responsible for securing the event.
According to the report described by NewsNation, 102 radio transmissions were missed.
The Secret Service instead received only five phone calls and three text messages concerning Crooks, McHugh said.
Helen focused on the fact that even those limited communications did not produce a stronger response.
“They’re admitting they got five calls and texts, and they didn’t do anything,” McHugh told her.
Her reaction was direct.
“Why?” she asked. “Why wouldn’t you have reacted from one?”
The failure to create a shared communications structure appears especially serious because large events depend on several agencies seeing the same threat picture. When local police, federal agents, counter-sniper teams, and event security are working from separate information, suspicious activity can remain everyone’s concern without becoming anyone’s immediate responsibility.
That does not establish intentional wrongdoing, but it does show how a chain of avoidable mistakes can become fatal.
Questions About Crooks Remain
Crooks was killed by a Secret Service counter-sniper after firing on the rally, leaving investigators without the possibility of questioning him.
Authorities have still not publicly identified a clear motive for the attempted assassination, according to McHugh’s report.
Helen said she believes Crooks was the only shooter at the rally, but she does not believe he acted entirely alone.
“I don’t believe there was another shooter there,” she said. “But I believe that he was working with somebody.”
She went further, telling McHugh that she suspects the attack was connected to someone inside government and believes it was political.
When asked whether she had seen evidence supporting that belief, Helen said she had “been told things” and referred to an experience that happened shortly after the shooting.
She did not publicly provide the details needed to verify those claims.
That distinction matters. Her suspicions reflect the view of a grieving widow who has received incomplete answers, but they are not proof of a conspiracy or government involvement.
The continuing absence of a publicly established motive has created room for speculation, and officials have done little to reduce that distrust when families remain dissatisfied with the explanations they have received.
The proper response is not to treat every theory as fact, but to demand that agencies release as much verified information as possible and clearly explain what remains unknown.
Secret Service Contact Came a Year Later
Helen told NewsNation that it took approximately one year for the Secret Service to contact her.
When the agency finally did reach out, she said the questions she raised were not answered fully.
That delay appears to have deepened her belief that the government has not treated her family with the urgency or openness it deserves.
A family who lost someone during a major federal protection failure should not have to spend months wondering whether the agency involved will contact them.
Even when an investigation limits what officials can disclose, consistent communication can at least show relatives that their questions are being taken seriously.
Helen’s complaint suggests that this did not happen.
The family was left to grieve while watching public hearings, official reviews, and political arguments unfold around an event they experienced at the closest possible range.
For outsiders, Butler became a national security story and a defining political image. For Helen and her daughters, it remained the day Corey died in front of them.
Corey’s Final Act Saved His Family
McHugh’s report returned repeatedly to what Corey did when the attack began.
He did not have time to study the roofline, understand the security failure, or wait for instructions.
He reacted immediately by covering his wife and daughter with his body.
That decision cost him his life and may have saved theirs.
Helen said she does not want the public to forget the human cost behind the images of Trump rising with blood on his face and being rushed from the stage.
Her husband’s death can easily become a secondary detail in discussions centered on Trump, Crooks, the Secret Service, and the political effects of the attack.
For the Comperatore family, however, Corey is not a footnote.
He was the person who absorbed the bullet that might otherwise have struck someone he loved.
The courage of that act deserves to remain central to the story, particularly when so much public discussion has focused on theories and institutional blame.
A Plea to President Trump
Helen told McHugh that she believes closure will come only when everyone responsible for planning or enabling the attack is identified and held accountable.
“When the people who put this all together that day are caught, and it comes out,” she said.
Again, the available public evidence does not establish that Crooks had accomplices, but Helen’s demand for a fuller accounting extends beyond that belief.
The documented security failures alone require clear answers about decision-making, communication, staffing, and why Trump was allowed to take the stage while concerns about a suspicious person remained unresolved.
Asked what message she would send to Trump, Helen pleaded with him not to forget the people who were caught in the gunfire around him.
“Just don’t forget us, and remember what we went through that day,” she said. “We’re still here. We need answers.”
Her words make clear that the second anniversary did not bring closure.
It brought another reminder that time has passed without giving the family the certainty they expected from federal investigators and the agencies responsible for protecting the rally.
Two Years Later, the Central Questions Remain
The Butler shooting has already produced investigations, reports, resignations, and admissions of major security failures.
What it has not produced is a publicly accepted explanation of Crooks’ motive or an answer that satisfies Corey Comperatore’s widow.
Helen’s strongest claims about possible assistance or government involvement remain unproven and should be treated that way.
But her broader anger is supported by the known breakdowns described in the DHS findings and by the simple fact that a gunman reached an open rooftop with a clear line of sight after being noticed by people on the grounds.
Corey Comperatore did what the security operation failed to do in that instant: he protected the people beside him.
His family is now asking the government to show the same sense of responsibility by explaining how the attack was allowed to happen and what has been learned from it.
Two years later, Helen is still returning to the same question.
Why was there ever a first shot?
A former park ranger and wildlife conservationist, Lisa’s passion for survival started with her deep connection to nature. Raised on a small farm in northern Wisconsin, she learned how to grow her own food, raise livestock, and live off the land. Lisa is our dedicated Second Amendment news writer and also focuses on homesteading, natural remedies, and survival strategies. Lisa aims to help others live more sustainably and prepare for the unexpected.
