The Pennsylvania congressman Brendan Boyle has become the first Democrat to call for the director of the US Secret Service, Kimberly Cheatle, to resign as more security lapses that may have contributed to the near-assassination of Donald Trump on 13 July continue coming to light.
In a statement issued after the Washington Post reported on Saturday that the presidential protection agency had for two years denied Trump requests for additional security, Boyle said he had “no confidence” in the Secret Service leadership.
“I am calling on Director Cheatle to resign immediately following last weekend’s shooting of a presidential candidate in western Pennsylvania,” Boyle said in a statement posted to X Saturday.
“The evidence coming to light has shown unacceptable operational failures,” he added. “I have no confidence in the leadership of the United States Secret Service if Director Cheatle chooses to remain in her position.”
Senior Republicans, including the House speaker, Mike Johnson, and the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, have called for new leadership. McConnell said: “The nation deserves answers and accountability. New leadership at the Secret Service would be an important step in that direction.”
On Sunday, Johnson addressed Republican complaints that Trump was not adequately protected because Cheatle had prioritized diversity recruiting initiatives in the agency – a position not shared by the former president’s family or his campaign for a second White House term.
“No, ma’am – that is not your top priority,” Johnson told CNN. “We want the most capable officers regardless of gender. Their job is protection, not diversity. That was a frustrating thing for people to see in the light of the lapses that took place apparently last weekend.
“People just don’t understand why basic tasks were not taken. Director Cheatle said people were not on that roof because of the slant, and she was worried about the health and safety of her agents. That makes no sense to us. She has a lot to answer for.”
Johnson’s comments came a day after the homeland security secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, issued a statement dismissing assertions that female Secret Service agents had performed inadequately as “baseless and insulting”. Mayorkas had also praised women serving in law enforcement across the US for risking “their lives on the frontlines for the safety and security of others”.
Boyle was the first elected Democrat to call for Cheatle’s resignation. The Secret Service director, a Biden White House appointee, was confronted by Republican senators at their party’s recent national convention demanding she step down, but she has said through her office that she has no plans to do so.
Pressure on Cheatle to resign has increased since it was revealed that 20 minutes passed between when Secret Service snipers first spotted the would-be assassin on a nearby rooftop and the time he fired at Trump.
By the time the gunman, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, was shot dead at the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, the former president’s ear had been hit by a bullet, one spectator had been killed and two others were wounded.
On Saturday, it was reported that Crooks’ operation to assassinate the former president was more elaborate and planned than previously known. He had visited the fairgrounds in Butler on several occasions and flown a camera-equipped drone over the rally site on the morning of shootings.
It was also reported that top officials repeatedly rejected requests from Trump’s security detail for more manpower and equipment for two years before the assassination attempt.
According to the Washington Post, agents with Trump’s security detail requested magnetometers and more agents to screen audience members at indoor events the former president attended as well as additional snipers and specialty teams at outdoor events.
The requests were denied by agency officials who typically cited a lack of resources. At the Butler rally, areas outside the perimeter, including the glass research factory that Crooks used as a perch, were assigned to local police.
Crooks was able to fire about seven rounds from his position with an AR-15 despite warnings from the public that a man with a gun was “bear-crawling” on the roof with a rifle. Cheatle has also told lawmakers that the Secret Service considered the roof too “sloped” to place a counter-sniper team atop.
Secret Service spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi had denied that the agency had rejected Trump’s requests for additional security. But on Saturday, he said that new information had come to light.
“The Secret Service has a vast, challenging, and intricate mission,” Guglielmi said in a statement. “Every day we work in a dynamic threat environment to ensure our protectees are safe and secure across multiple events, travel, and other difficult environments.”
Guglielmi said the agency is “committed to better understanding what happened before, during, and after” the shooting “to ensure it never happens again”.
Cheatle is set to face lawmakers at a hearing on Monday to explain the security lapses that led up to the attempted assassination.
“Americans demand answers from director Kimberly Cheatle about the Secret Service’s historic security failures that led to the attempted assassination of President Trump, murder of an innocent victim, and harm to others in the crowd,” Kentucky Republican James Comer, who heads the House oversight committee, said in a statement.
At a rally in Milwaukee on Saturday, Trump told the crowd he “took a bullet for democracy”. In an interview with Fox News set to air on Monday, the Republican nominee for November’s presidential election questioned how Crooks had got on the roof – and why he wasn’t reported.
“You had Trumpers screaming … ‘There’s a man on the roof who’s got a gun,’” he said. “And that was quite a bit before I walked on to the stage. So you would’ve thought somebody would’ve done something about it.”
