Trump Assassination row: Director of the US Secret Service Kimberly Cheatle has resigned amid criticism for security failings connected to the murder attempt on former President Donald Trump during a rally in Pennsylvania. After the US Secret Service Director’s first hearing, she resigned.
During the House Oversight Committee hearing on Monday, Cheatle—who has been in charge of the US Secret Service since 2022—was subjected to a barrage of questions over the agency’s response to the attempt on Trump’s life during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Through an email to the workforce, the director of the Secret Service announced her resignation. “I fully accept responsibility for the security breach,” she wrote in the workplace email on Tuesday. “It is with heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to step down as your director in light of recent events.”
Director of the Secret Service Kimberly Cheatle was already being called to step down due to anger over her testimony over the agency’s failure to defend Trump. Numerous politicians, both Democratic and Republican, reportedly urged her to step down, according to Reuters.
The day following her testimony before a congressional committee, when she was criticized by Republicans and Democrats alike for security lapses associated with the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a rally, Kimberly Cheatle tendered her resignation.
Cheatle accepted full responsibility for the mistakes and called the episode the Secret Service’s biggest operational failure in decades. She The director of the US Secret Service described the attempt on Donald Trump’s life as the agency’s biggest setback since the shooting of then-President Ronald Reagan in 1981.
Lawmakers, however, were not impressed with her lack of detailed responses regarding the current probe.
One rallygoer was killed in the gunfire, while Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump suffered a minor cut to his right ear.
When the 20-year-old gunman, Thomas Matthew Crooks, began fire, he was only 135 meters (157 yards) away from the platform where the former president was speaking. That’s even though Trump had extra security in the days preceding up to the July 13 rally due to an Iranian threat to his life.
(With agency inputs)