Headlines for July 23, 2024

On Capitol Hill, lawmakers on the House Oversight Committee grilled Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle Monday over security failures ahead of the July 13 Trump assassination attempt, which Cheatle admitted was her agency’s “most significant operational failure.”

Kimberly Cheatle: “The Secret Service’s solemn mission is to protect our nation’s leaders. On July 13th, we failed. As a director of the United States Secret Service, I take full responsibility for any security lapse of our agency.”

Both Democrats and Republicans are calling on Cheatle to resign after she repeatedly stonewalled lawmakers when pressed on more specifics around what went wrong. Among the few things Cheatle did reveal was that her agency was informed about a suspicious figure multiple times before the shooting and that the roof the gunman shot from had been identified as a potential security vulnerability. She also said the shooter was not considered a “threat” until “seconds before the gunfire started.”

Meanwhile, House Republicans used Monday’s hearing to lash out at the Secret Service’s DEI policies — that’s diversity, equity and inclusion — in a series of misogynistic attacks. Tim Burchett of Tennessee told Cheatle, “Ma’am, you are a DEI horror story,” while Texas lawmaker Michael Cloud asked Cheatle, “Does every Secret Service agent meet the same qualifications, or do you have different standards for different people?”