Examining the hearing Secret serviceThe response to the assassination attempt against Donald Trump went off the rails on Thursday, when a pair of shouting matches broke out between the acting director, Ronald Rowe, and the Republican deputy.
The hearing, which was held by the House shortly after the first assassination attempt against Trump in July, was meant to explore the trail. Secret Service took to improve security measures, but Pat Fallon, Republican of Texas, took the question of Rowe in a different direction.
Fallon shows an enlarged photo from a September 11 commemoration of the attack in New York, than both Joe Biden. and the trumpet attended earlier this year. Fallon accused Rowe, who was standing directly behind Biden and Kamala Harris in the photo, of taking the special agent’s turn that day and endangering the president’s security because of the photo op.
Rowe responded that the special agent was just in the picture, and attacked Fallon for the political attacks of September 11th.
“I responded to Ground Zero. I was going there through the ashes of the World Trade Center,” said Rowe.
“I’m not begging you,” Fallon interrupted his voice. “Does the special agent have a case for you?”
Rowe yelled back: “I was there to pay my respects to a member of the Secret Service who died on 9/11.”
Fallon suggested that Rowe, who is not expected to stay on as director once Trump takes office in January, had given himself a better chance of “auditioning” for the role in the event Harris won the presidency.
“Don’t invoke 9/11 for political reasons,” Rowe told Fallon.
“I’m not,” Fallon replied. He accused Rowe: “You risked the life of President Biden, the life of Vice President Harris, because you fired those agents.”
Rowe denied this charge, telling Fallon: “You’re out of line.”
The chairman of the committee, Republican Mike Kelly, waved his cheers repeatedly until the outcry stopped. The heated exchange comes as the Secret Service comes under intense scrutiny over its security practices, which drew widespread condemnation after an assassination attempt against Trump.
The administration offered no such assurances to Trump’s safety campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvaniawhere a gunman fatally wounded then-presidential candidate and gunman named Corey Comperatore. Rowe’s predecessor is Kimberly Cheatle. they resigned amid bipartisan criticism of the security agency’s handling of the collision.
At the hearing on Thursday, Rowe described the events surrounding the assassination attempt as “an abject failure.”
“July 13th was the failure of the Secret Service to adequately secure the Butler Farm location and protect President-elect Trump,” Rowe said. “That lack of oversight is a critical gap in the operations of the Secret Service, and we recognize that we are not meeting the expectations of the American public.”
Rowe offered his condolences to the Purchaser family and pursued a series of agency changes since the July attack, including creating a drone unit for local surveillance and streamlining communications with local authorities.
“I’ll see: there will be accountability, and that’s what happens,” Rowe told the task force. “It is necessary that we recognize the gravity of our failure. I myself bear the weight of knowing that we have almost lost our protection and that the failure of a father and a husband cost their lives.”
Since its formation in July, the business has conducted 46 interviews and reviewed about 20,000 pages of documents, Kelly said Thursday. The task force is expected to release a final report on its findings in the coming days.