Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle told lawmakers the agency “failed” in its mission to protect the president after former President Trump was wounded earlier this month during a campaign rally.
“The Secret Service’s solemn mission is to protect our nation’s leaders. On July 13th, we failed. As the Director of the United States Secret Service, I take full responsibility for any security lapse,” Cheatle said in prepared opening remarks as she appeared before the House Oversight Committee.
“We must learn what happened and I will move heaven and earth to ensure an incident like July 13th does not happen again. Thinking about what we should have done differently is never far from my thoughts.”
Cheatle’s appearance comes as numerous GOP lawmakers have demanded her resignation after Trump was struck in the ear by a shooter.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) have both demanded she step down, and House Homeland Security Chair Mark Green (R-Tenn.) added to that chorus Monday morning.
Cheatle said in an ABC News interview last week that she will not step down, and on Monday plans to stress the agency’s plans to cooperate with a series of investigations into how the agency failed to stop the shooter.
In addition to injuring Trump’s ear, the attack left one attendee at the Butler, Pa., rally dead and two others critically injured.
Further inflaming tensions is the acknowledgement from the Secret Service over the weekend that it had previously denied some requests from the Trump campaign for beefed up security, walking back a previous statement that such assertions were “absolutely false.”
Cheatle’s remarks nod to accusations of political bias within the agency.
“Our mission is not political. It is literally a matter of life and death, as the tragic events on July 13th remind us. I have full confidence in the men and women of the Secret Service. They are worthy of our support in executing our protective mission,” she wrote.