How are candidates protected in 2024? The surprising security measures you didn't know about

The race to become President of the United States of America is hotting up and tensions are rising between both sides as their campaigns come to a close. Votes are coming in across the country and soon one of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump will become the most powerful person in the world.

Givens what‘s at stake, security is high surrounding the two candidates as they tour the country looking to seal the votes of those who have decided and sway those who haven’t. Lines of blacked-out cars speed down the street with the candidates present inside, and blue flashing lights accompany them at all moments on the road.

But there are plenty of other ways apart from sheer presence that are used to protect the two: recently, congress passed a bill that ramped up the security levels around both candidates to what we see with the current President, Joe Biden, after an assassination attempt on Donald Trump that occurred in Butler, Pennsylvania, just months ago.

What security measures are in place for the two candidates?

First of all, for Mr Trump, no golf is allowed. The Secret Service deem it too much of a security risk for the former President to play in a wide-open field ahead of the election. Also, after the assassination attempt, rallies must be staged with a bulletproof glass shielding the business magnate at all times.

Secret Service agents accompany him off planes and follow him wherever he goes, and stern-faced bodies stand in his way as he greets fans. “I am surrounded by more men, guns, and weapons than I have ever seen before,” Trump wrote in posts on Truth Social and X.

NBC reported that things are pretty similar for Kamala Harris, too, who also conducts rallies behind bulletproof glass and has someone in sunglasses on her shoulder as well. Added to that in their report is “the black tarp that now obscures what once was a clean view of Harris boarding Marine Two at the Naval Observatory in Washington”. When she is in town, high-rise buildings, hotels, and parking garages around the are are swept for any potential dangers.

Thermal Drones, advanced ballistics, aerial surveillance and snipers

CNN reported that Donald Trump requested thermal imaging drones as part of his security detail, which is not a surprise given that Evy Poumpouras, a former Secret Service agent, told NBC that “they are all now getting presidential-level protection from the U.S. Secret Service, which has never been done before. Everything is in a much-heightened state right now. And they are extremely hypervigilant at the moment.”

She added that presidential levels of security can mean getting a counterassault team, a counter-surveillance unit, a counter-sniper response unit and bulletproof vehicles.

And according to agency spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi who spoke to CNN, flight restrictions over Trump’s residence are already imposed, as is the case for when he travels.

Guglielmi added that the former president, reportedly not satisfied with the Secret Service, “is receiving the highest level of technical security assets which include unmanned aerial vehicles, counter unmanned aerial surveillance systems, ballistics and other advanced technology systems”.