AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
The conservative activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated Wednesday while speaking at Utah Valley University. Authorities say the sniper fired a single shot from a rooftop about 150 yards away. On Friday, a suspect, 22-year-old Tyler Robinson, was taken into custody. Kirk's death has prompted questions about how vulnerable public figures are to violence and what can be done about that, especially at outdoor events. NPR's Meg Anderson joins us now. Welcome to the program.
MEG ANDERSON, BYLINE: Thanks for having me.
RASCOE: So what is the - or what is typical in securing an outdoor event like this?
ANDERSON: Yeah. So there were about 3,000 people at this particular event. It was held in sort of a quad. The university's police chief said Wednesday they had about six officers working the event. Kirk had his own private security team as well. But security experts I spoke to said that number of officers was not enough for an event of this size. Given those limited resources, they said security would typically be focused on threats in close proximity. You know, someone rushing the stage with a handgun or a knife. What ended up happening was obviously different, and more officers on the ground, you know, maybe wouldn't have prevented that. But I should say, we don't know exactly what the security plan was. I reached out to the university. I have not heard back.
RASCOE: What would have to happen to keep someone safe from a sniper attack like this?
ANDERSON: Yeah. So pre-planning is important. You know, checking out an event space ahead of time to look for vulnerabilities. It's unclear if that happened. Kirk was essentially sitting in a bowl - a low point with a lot of tall buildings around him. That was a big vulnerability. And then, you know, there are fancier things that you can do to add protection. You could use ballistic glass, drones, counter snipers, surveillance technology. All of those security measures, though, get expensive fast. That is according to Stuart Kaplan. He's a former FBI special agent who now does threat assessments.
STUART KAPLAN: Could I anticipate all what-ifs? Can I consider the worst-case scenarios to get it to the level of my company protecting a sitting United States president? Absolutely, but who would bear the cost?
ANDERSON: He says, you know, the level of protection you'd give to a current or former president is more than what Charlie Kirk and others like him could probably afford. And even then, gaps in security can happen. Take last summer in Butler, Pennsylvania. President Trump survived a very close-call assassination attempt at a campaign rally. He had many of those layers of protection.
RASCOE: So what can we expect the impact to be from Kirk's assassination when it comes to security?
ANDERSON: Right. So I spoke with Jason Russell about that. He was in the Secret Service. He's now a security consultant. He said he wouldn't be surprised if we start seeing, you know, more security at events - metal detectors, things like that - or even public figures holding fewer events or moving them to indoor spaces, which are typically easier to protect. But he said none of that fixes the deeper problem.
JASON RUSSELL: You know, obviously, if you pay any attention to social media, it's extremely divisive, and now it's become almost a us-versus-them mentality.
ANDERSON: You know, and research bears that out. Support for political violence is growing among both Democrats and Republicans, and we have seen a string of politically motivated attacks recently. There was the Trump assassination attempt, the arson attack on Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro's home, the murder of a Minnesota lawmaker. And, of course, now this killing.
RASCOE: That's NPR's Meg Anderson. Thank you so much for joining us.
ANDERSON: You're welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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