US Secret Service director Kim Cheatle has resigned over security lapses which enabled the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump on 13 July at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
“As your director, I take full responsibility for the security lapse, “Cheatle said in a resignation letter to agency staff.
Lawmakers from both Democratic and Republican parties had called on her to step down during a contentious congressional hearing on Monday about the shooting.
They became increasingly upset when she evaded questions about the shooting at Trump’s campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, earlier this month.
In her resignation letter, Cheatle said she had always “put the needs of the agency first” and it was “with a heavy heart” that she made her decision.
“The scrutiny over the last week has been intense and will continue to remain as our operational tempo increases,” she said.
“I do not want my calls for resignation to be a distraction from the great work each and every one of you do towards our vital mission.”
In a statement, President Joe Biden expressed gratitude for her decades of public service.
“The independent review to get to the bottom of what happened on July 13 continues, and I look forward to assessing its conclusions. We all know what happened that day can never happen again,” he said.
Biden said an appointment would soon be made to fill the vacant position created by her resignation.
For now, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas has appointed Ronald Rowe as acting director of the agency.
Rowe has been in the Secret Service for 24 years and has held the position of deputy director since April 2023.
Biden appointed Cheatle to the position of Director of the Secret Service – which oversees the protection of current and former presidents and other officials – in 2022. She had previously put in 27 years of service at the agency in various roles.
During her time as an agent, Cheatle was involved in evacuating then Vice-President Dick Cheney from the White House during the 11 September 2001 attacks.
Before her appointment as deputy assistant director of protective operations, she had served as supervisor of Biden’s protective detail when he was vice-president.
However, her leadership came under public scrutiny after the shooting at Trump’s 13 July rally, where a bullet grazed the former president’s ear.
The attack left one rally attendant dead and two others badly wounded.
Lawmakers grilled Cheatle about security preparations ahead of the campaign rally during the six-hour House of Representatives Oversight Committee hearing.
Cheatle accepted responsibility for the security lapses, but pushed back on calls to resign.
She described the shooting as “the most significant operational failure at the Secret Service in decades”.
Witnesses had raised an alarm after spotting a suspicious man – suspect Thomas Matthew Crooks – with a rifle on a rooftop at the rally minutes before shots were fired.
Crooks was killed by a counter-sniper shortly afterwards.
Security and law enforcement officers from a number of different agencies were present at the rally.
During her testimony, Cheatle didn’t offer lawmakers any new explanation on how Crooks was able to access the roof where he was perched and why Trump was allowed to take the stage.
After the hearing, the leading Republican and Democrat from the committee – James Comer and Jamie Raskin – sent a letter to Cheatle demanding her resignation.
Comer said Cheatle “instilled no confidence” during the hearing that she can fulfill the Secret Service’s protective mission.
“The Oversight Committee’s hearing resulted in Director Cheatle’s resignation and there will be more accountability to come,” he said in a statement posted on X, formerly Twitter.
In a post on his social media platform on Tuesday, Trump said: “The Biden/Harris Administration did not properly protect me, and I was forced to take a bullet for Democracy.”
Reactions have been trailing Cheatle’s resignation.
Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson described her resignation as “overdue” and said he was “glad she did the right thing”.
“Now we have to pick up the pieces, we have to rebuild the American people’s faith and trust in the Secret Service,” he told reporters.
Teresa Wilson, an ex-marine who attended the rally, told the BBC that she was “glad [Cheatle] succumbed to the pressure”.
“I hope they still follow through with the independent investigation now that she’s resigned. We want answers,” she said.
In a separate hearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, Pennsylvania State Police Commissioner Christopher Paris detailed a number of security mistakes ahead of the shooting,
According to Paris, two officers on a vantage point above the roof from where Thomas Matthew Crooks was shooting left their post to help investigate reports of a suspicious person.
A police officer later confronted Crooks on the roof just a few seconds before he opened fire on Trump.
While acknowledging “critical failures” at the Butler rally, he said the Secret Service “ultimately is responsible and is the final arbiter of any security matters affecting their protectee and the public”.
Source: BBC News
