U.S. Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle enters a House of Representatives Oversight Committee hearing on the security lapses that allowed an attempted assassination of Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump, on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., July 22, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The director of the Secret Service said on July 23 she is resigning following the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump that unleashed intensifying outcry about how the agency tasked with protecting current and former Presidents could fail in its core mission.

Kimberly Cheatle, who had served as Secret Service director since August 2022, had been facing growing calls to resign and several investigations into how the shooter was able to get so close to the Republican presidential nominee at an outdoor campaign rally in Pennsylvania.

“I take full responsibility for the security lapse,” she said in an email to staff, obtained by The Associated Press. “In light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to step down as your director.”

Ms. Cheatle’s departure was unlikely to end the scrutiny of the long-troubled agency after the failures of July 13, and it comes at a critical juncture ahead of the Democratic National Convention and a busy presidential campaign season. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have promised continued investigation, along with an inspector general probe and an independent and bipartisan effort launched at President Joe Biden’s behest that will keep the agency in the spotlight.

“The scrutiny over the last week has been intense and will continue to remain as our operational tempo increases,” Ms. Cheatle said in her note to staff.

Ms. Cheatle’s resignation comes a day after appeared before a congressional committee and was berated by hours by both Democrats and Republicans for the security failures. She called the attempt on Mr. Trump’s life the Secret Service’s “most significant operational failure” in decades and said she took full responsibility for the security lapses, but she angered lawmakers by failing to answer specific questions about the investigation.

At the hearing on July 22, Ms. Cheatle remained defiant that she was the “right person” to lead the Secret Service, even as she said she took responsibility the security failures. When Republican Rep. Nancy Mace suggested Ms. Cheatle begin drafting her resignation letter from the hearing room, Ms. Cheatle responded, “No, thank you.”

The 20-year-old shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, was able to get within 135m of the stage where the former President was speaking when he opened fire. That’s despite a threat on Mr. Trump’s life from Iran leading to additional security for the former President in the days before the July 13 rally.

Ms. Cheatle acknowledged on July 22 that the Secret Service was told about a suspicious person two to five times before the shooting at the rally. She also revealed that the roof from which Crooks opened fire had been identified as a potential vulnerability days before the rally. But she failed to answer many questions about what happened, including why there no agents stationed on the roof.

A bloodied Mr. Trump was quickly escorted off the stage by Secret Service agents, and agency snipers killed the shooter. Mr. Trump said the upper part of his right ear was pierced in the shooting. One rallygoer was killed, and two others were critically wounded.

“The assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump on July 13th is the most significant operational failure at the Secret Service in decades,” Ms. Cheatle told members of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee. “As the Director of the United States Secret Service, I take full responsibility for any security lapse.”

Details continue to unfold about signs of trouble that day and what role both the Secret Service and local authorities played in security. The agency routinely relies on local law enforcement to secure the perimeter of events where people it is protecting appear. Former top Secret Service agents said the gunman should never have been allowed to gain access to the roof.

Two days after the shooting, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said he supported Ms. Cheatle “100%.”

But there were calls for accountability across the political spectrum, with Congressional Committees immediately moving to investigate, issuing a subpoena to testify and the top Republican leaders from both the House and the Senate saying she should step down. Mr. Biden, a Democrat, ordered an independent review into security at the rally, and the Secret Service’s inspector general opened an investigation. The agency is also reviewing its counter sniper team’s “preparedness and operations.”

In an interview with ABC News two days after the shooting, Ms. Cheatle said she wasn’t resigning. She called the shooting “unacceptable” and something that no Secret Service agent wants to happen. She said her agency is responsible for the former President’s protection: “The buck stops with me. I am the director of the Secret Service.”

Ms. Cheatle served in the Secret Service for 27 years. She left in 2021 for a job as a security executive at PepsiCo before Mr. Biden asked her to return in 2022 to head the agency with a workforce of 7,800 special agents, uniformed officers and other staff.

She took over amid a controversy over missing text messages from around the time thousands of Mr. Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, following his 2020 election loss to Mr. Biden.

During her time in the agency, Ms. Cheatle was the first woman to be named assistant director of protective operations, the division that provides protection to the president and other dignitaries, where she oversaw a $133.5 million budget. She is the second woman to lead the agency.

When Mr. Biden announced Ms. Cheatle’s appointment, he said she had served on his detail when he was Vice President and he and his wife “came to trust her judgment and counsel.”

U.S. Secret Service personnel and other law enforcement officials escort Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump after he was shot at during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, U.S., on July 13, 2024.
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has appointed a bipartisan, independent panel to review this month’s assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, officials said Sunday.

The panel members will have “extensive law enforcement and security experience to conduct a 45-day independent review of the planning for and actions taken by the U.S. Secret Service and state and local authorities before, during, and after the rally, and the U.S. Secret Service governing policies and procedures,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement.

Also read: ‘Nobody mentioned it’: Trump says he received no warnings before assassination attempt

The first people named to the panel are former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano; Frances Townsend, former Homeland Security adviser to President George W. Bush; Mark Filip, a former federal judge and deputy attorney general to President George W. Bush; and David Mitchell, former Secretary of the Department of Public Safety and Homeland Security for the state of Delaware. Additional experts could be asked to join the group in the coming days, the statement said.

Editorial | Dodging bullets: On an assassination bid and U.S. politics

The panel will have 45 days to review the policies and procedures of the Secret Service before, during and after the rally on July 13 where a gunman fired at Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania.

“We formed this bipartisan group to quickly identify improvements the U.S. Secret Service can implement to enhance their work. We must all work together to ensure events like July 13 do not happen again,” members of the independent review panel said in a joint statement.

Secret Service Director Kim Cheatle said she welcomes the review. “I look forward to the panel examining what happened and providing recommendations to help ensure it will never happen again,” she said in a statement. “The U.S. Secret Service is continuing to take steps to review our actions internally and remain committed to working quickly and transparently with other investigations, including those by Congress, FBI and the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General.”

Ms. Cheatle is set to testify on July 22 before the House Oversight Committee.

Republican Presidential nominee and former President Donald J. Trump attends a public campaign at the Van Andel Arena in Grand Rapids, Michigan on July 20, 2024. This is also Trump’s first public rally since he was shot in an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania on July 13
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

Donald Trump said on July 20 nobody warned him of a problem in the lead-up to the former president’s rally in Pennsylvania last week when a would-be assassin shot him in the ear.

“Nobody mentioned it, nobody said there was a problem. I would’ve waited for 15, they could’ve said let’s wait for 15 minutes, 20 minutes, 5 minutes, something. Nobody said,” Mr. Trump told Fox News in an interview. “I think that was a mistake,” he added. “How did somebody get on that roof? And why wasn’t he reported?”

The Washington Post on Saturday reported that top officials at the U.S. Secret Service repeatedly rejected requests from Mr. Trump’s security detail for more manpower and gear at events before the attempted assassination. The agency, which is responsible for Mr. Trump’s protection, denied these requests, saying at times that it lacked resources, the newspaper reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Editorial | Dodging bullets: On an assassination bid and U.S. politics

The Secret Service did not immediately respond outside regular office hours to a Reuters request for comment.

Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle is set to testify before the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight Committee on July 22 for a hearing related to the shooting at Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania last week.

Washington:

Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle has agreed to testify before the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight Committee on July 22 for a hearing related to the shooting of former President Donald Trump at a rally, the panel said on Wednesday.

WHY IT IS IMPORTANT

Security at the Republican presidential candidate’s rally in Pennsylvania has been under scrutiny after the former president was shot on Saturday at the event. The FBI said it was probing the shooting as an assassination attempt.

The shooting has raised serious concerns about how the suspect was able to access a nearby rooftop with a direct line of sight to where Trump was speaking.

Trump has since said he was doing well and has appeared at the Republican National Convention this week but the shooting left his face streaked with blood after his right ear was hit. A rally attendee was killed in the shooting, two others were wounded and the suspect is dead.

KEY QUOTES

“Americans demand and deserve answers from Director Cheatle about the attempted assassination of President Trump and the Secret Service’s egregious failures,” the Republican-led House oversight panel said on Wednesday, adding Cheatle agreed to comply with a subpoena issued by the committee’s chair.

“The hearing will take place as scheduled on Monday, July 22,” the panel added.

CONTEXT

Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden, who will face Republican Trump in November’s election, said on Sunday he had ordered an independent review, and Republican lawmakers in Congress have also vowed swift investigations.

Cheatle said on Monday the Trump rally shooting was “unacceptable” and that she would not resign her post. Top Republicans in the U.S. Congress called on Wednesday for her to resign.

The Secret Service is responsible for protecting presidents and former presidents.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)