--- title: Report: Secret Service Has Spoken With Donald Trump Campaign description: The Secret Service has spoken with Donald Trump's campaign about his 'Second Amendment people' comment, according to a new report. canonical: https://time.com/4447144/donald-trump-second-amendment-people-secret-service/ author: Will Drabold article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-08-10T19:46:38.000Z article:modified_time: 2023-12-13T04:23:41.000Z article:section: Politics og:title: Secret Service Has Spoken With Trump Campaign: Report og:description: The agency earlier said it was "aware" of the comments. og:url: https://time.com/4447144/donald-trump-second-amendment-people-secret-service/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7817ee38dcf15181/6988a1bf2dce0141bf9ea3da/donald-trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks to the Trask Coliseum at University of North Carolina in Wilmington, North Carolina og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Secret Service Has Spoken With Trump Campaign: Report twitter:description: The agency earlier said it was "aware" of the comments. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7817ee38dcf15181/6988a1bf2dce0141bf9ea3da/donald-trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Secret Service Has Spoken With Donald Trump Campaign: Report > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [Will Drabold](https://time.com/author/will-drabold/) ## Will Drabold Updated: Dec 13, 2023 4:23 AM UTCPublished: Aug 10, 2016 7:46 PM UTC  Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks to the Trask Coliseum at University of North Carolina in Wilmington, N.C., on Aug. 9, 2016. Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks to the Trask Coliseum at University of North Carolina in Wilmington, N.C., on Aug. 9, 2016.Erich Thayer—Reuters by [Will Drabold](https://time.com/author/will-drabold/) ## Will Drabold Updated: Dec 13, 2023 4:23 AM UTCPublished: Aug 10, 2016 7:46 PM UTC The U.S. Secret Service reached out to the Donald Trump campaign over comments he made at a rally Tuesday about “Second Amendment people,” [according to a report on CNN](https://twitter.com/CNNSitRoom/status/763447021676015616). The agency would neither confirm nor deny the report to TIME. “Those statements did not come from our public affairs office,” said Joseph Casey, a spokesperson for the Secret Service. He added he could not confirm the Secret Service reached out to the Trump campaign. Trump tweeted late Wednesday that the report was inaccurate. > [](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/763477408909500416) At a rally Tuesday, Trump made a comment that [some argued could encourage violence](http://time.com/4445467/donald-trump-hillary-clinton-second-amendment-judges) against federal judges or Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton while talking about what kinds of judges she could appoint as president. “If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know,” he said. On Tuesday, a former top Secret Service official [told TIME](http://time.com/4445735/former-secret-service-official-donald-trump-is-pretty-close-to-the-edge/?xid=homepage) the agency would likely speak with Trump’s campaign about the comments. The agency has also tweeted about the remarks. > [](https://twitter.com/SecretService/status/763142627202048000) “The Secret Service saying, ‘We are aware of this,’ I hear that as saying, ‘We really are concerned about this,'” said Stephen Saltzburg, a law professor at George Washington University [who has worked](https://www.law.gwu.edu/stephen-saltzburg) at various levels of federal law enforcement. “They’re gonna say, ‘We’re aware.’ That’s a code word for, ‘We’re really concerned.'” **Read More:** [_Former Secret Service Official: Donald Trump Is ‘Pretty Close to the Edge’_](http://time.com/4445735/former-secret-service-official-donald-trump-is-pretty-close-to-the-edge/?xid=homepage) Saltzburg told TIME that the concern is whether someone might decide to act on that kind of rhetoric. “What we have to worry about here is, the same kind of people yelling, ‘Lock her up,’ may respond with something that’s more dangerous,” he said. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4447144/donald-trump-second-amendment-people-secret-service/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4447144/donald-trump-second-amendment-people-secret-service/"},"headline":"Secret Service Has Spoken With Donald Trump Campaign: Report","datePublished":"2016-08-10T19:46:38.000Z","dateModified":"2023-12-13T04:23:41.000Z","description":"The Secret Service has spoken with Donald Trump's campaign about his 'Second Amendment people' comment, according to a new report.","url":"https://time.com/4447144/donald-trump-second-amendment-people-secret-service/","keywords":["Donald Trump","2016 Election","Secret Service"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7817ee38dcf15181/6988a1bf2dce0141bf9ea3da/donald-trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Will Drabold","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/will-drabold/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt7817ee38dcf15181/6988a1bf2dce0141bf9ea3da/donald-trump5.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks to the Trask Coliseum at University of North Carolina in Wilmington, North Carolina","caption":"Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks to the Trask Coliseum at University of North Carolina in Wilmington, North Carolina, U.S., August 9, 2016. 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