U.S. Secret Service chief Kimberly Cheatle told a contentious congressional hearing Monday that the agency had its “most significant operational failure … in decades” when it failed to keep a young gunman from climbing a warehouse rooftop unimpeded at a political rally and then attempt to assassinate former President Donald Trump.
“On July 13, we failed,” Cheatle told the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Accountability in her opening statement ahead of extensive and pointed questioning about the attack on Trump at an outdoor rally in rural Pennsylvania. The gunmen fired at least eight shots toward the stage where Trump was speaking, grazing his right ear, killing a rally-goer and critically wounding two other spectators.
Cheatle, a nearly 30-year veteran of the security agency tasked with protecting U.S. presidents and other top officials, pledged to rectify the shortcomings that led to the attack on Trump. However, numerous lawmakers have demanded that she resign or that President Joe Biden fire her.
“I will move heaven and Earth to make sure an incident like July 13 never happens again,” she said. “Our mission is not political. It is literally a matter of life and death.”
Although several investigations are underway, Cheatle said, “We feel there were a sufficient number of agents assigned that day.”
Cheatle said Trump’s security team had not asked for additional protective measures at the rally, although the Secret Service had denied the request on numerous occasions for extra security at public events Trump has attended over the last two years. She said she did not know the number of times that had occurred.
But under initial, sharp questioning, Cheatle had no immediate answers for why agents were not stationed on the warehouse rooftop from where the gunman, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, had an unimpeded view of the rally stage about 150 meters away where Trump was speaking.
She said the gunman had been identified by police as a suspicious figure before the rally but did not know he was carrying a weapon. She had no explanation for why Trump was allowed to begin his speech even though authorities had determined there was a suspicious figure in the vicinity of the stage.
Representative James Jordan of Ohio, a Republican, told Cheatle the Secret Service security missteps at the rally were “pretty darn concerning for me and Americans.”
“It looks like you’re cutting corners” in providing enough security for Trump, Jordan said. Trump is the Republican presidential nominee in the November 5 election, looking to reclaim the White House after losing reelection in 2020.
House Speaker Mike Johnson joined other Republican officials in calling Sunday for Cheatle to resign or be fired in the aftermath of the security lapse.
One of Trump’s sons, Eric Trump, told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” that Cheatle “should resign in absolute disgrace.”
Cheatle has said she does not plan to quit.
The Secret Service had excluded the warehouse from its inner security perimeter it directly controlled, while leaving local police to patrol the warehouse area, even as local police told the agency they did not have enough resources to station a squad car adjacent to the warehouse. Crooks possibly climbed onto an air conditioning unit to reach the rooftop, authorities have said.
The would-be assassin apparently was able to walk freely in the outer security perimeter before climbing to the rooftop, even though local officers had spotted him, thought he was acting oddly and notified other law enforcement. But then, police say, they lost track of him.
In the hours after the assassination attempt, some former Secret Service agents said Congress for years had left the agency without adequate funding to hire enough armed agents to protect the growing number of key officials it has been tasked with protecting.
Cheatle said the agency currently is protecting 36 officials, as well as foreign leaders who visit the United States. The Secret Service has 8,000 employees and an annual budget of $3.1 billion.
