By John Solomon
Driving Vice President-elect Kamala Harris by an undetected bomb. Refusing extra resources for a presidential candidate. Admitting an agent on a White House detail assaulted her supervisor.
Long before the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump on Saturday night such focused a harsh light on the Secret Service, the presidential security agency was already facing difficult questions about its capability, training, recruitment and emphasis on diversity.
Secret Service agents reportedly were even circulating a petition raising questions about their management a few weeks ago.
Those questions are now certain to receive intense new attention after video footage showed a gunman on was able to scale a building less than 200 yards from Trump, get to a shooting perch with a rifle and fire several rounds before being neutralized by a Secret Service sniper team at the event Saturday night in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Several witnesses said they started to yell the man had a gun before he started shooting. And several lawmakers say they are now investigating reports that the Trump campaign had requested additional security resources recently, and was turned down.
“How could you have somebody on the rooftop?” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, himself a victim of political violence when he was seriously wounded at a congressional baseball practice. “There are reports that people watched him climb up the roof and even alerted authorities, and we’re going to be looking into that.”
How could that happen with all the authorities around that they miss something so clear that the shooter was able to get that kind of line of sight just 150 yards away from the stage?”
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer on Saturday night demanded the Secret Service provide Congress immediate answers as to how it failed to stop the assassination attempt.
Comer announced just hours after Trump survived the attack that he would be demanding testimony from the head of the Secret Service as well as documents and other evidence.
”I have already contacted the Secret Service for a briefing and am also calling on Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle to appear for a hearing,” he said on X. “The Oversight Committee will send a formal invitation soon. There are many questions and Americans demand answers.”
Criticism of the Secret Service spread quickly on social media – from X owner Elon Musk to members of Congress. Several urged Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mallorca to reconsider his denial of Secret Service resources for third-party presidential candidate Robert F Kennedy Jr.
“Extreme incompetence or it was deliberate. Either way, the SS leadership must resign,” Musk wrote.
Democrats also are likely to face new questions after Rep. Benny Thompson sought to end Trump‘s Secret Service protection recently and President Joe Biden reportedly told donors in recent days it was time to put a “bullseye” over his Republican rival.
Back in May, Congress requested a briefing with the Secret Service, after several incidents allegedly raised internal concerns over the quality of its trainings.
A petition within the Secret Service has reportedly been circulating because of the incidents and called for a congressional investigation into the agency, according to Comer.
One incident saw a Secret Service agent assigned to Vice President Kamala Harris allegedly attack her superior and other agents. The unnamed agent also exhibited other “concerning” behavior, according to her colleagues.
Comer mentioned the incident in a letter to Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle and asked for a briefing on how the Secret Service is responding to the allegations of “inadequate training.”
“This incident raised concerns within the agency about the hiring and screening process for this agent,” Comer wrote in his letter. “Specifically [concerns] whether previous incidents in her work history were overlooked during the hiring process as years of staff shortages had led the agency to lower once stricter standards as part of a diversity, equity and inclusion effort.”
Comer also flagged concerns from the petition related to a “double standard in disciplinary actions, and a vulnerability ‘to potential insider threats’ that could pose a risk to U.S. national security.”
The letter requests the briefing by June 13, and cites “potential vulnerabilities” that could keep the Secret Service from “fulfilling its mission to ensure the safety and security of its protectees,” including the president, vice president, and their families