Secret Ser­vice direc­tor grilled on reforms after Trump assas­si­na­tion attempts

Tes­ti­fy­ing dur­ing a House task force’s final hear­ing on the assas­si­na­tion attempts, Rowe said that dis­ci­pli­nary action against agents was under­way, and he list­ed out numer­ous changes he has made at the agency.

Rowe said that in response to the July 13 shoot­ing at a Trump ral­ly in But­ler, Penn­syl­va­nia, his review found there were “mul­ti­ple employ­ees that war­rant dis­ci­pli­nary action” and that while “there will be account­abil­i­ty,” due process takes time.

Rowe also said a “par­a­digm shift” has occurred at the agency that has includ­ed a high­er lev­el of pro­tec­tion for Trump; expand­ed use of unmanned aer­i­al sys­tems, such as drones; expand­ed use of bal­lis­tic coun­ter­mea­sures, such as bul­let­proof glass; and more train­ing for agents.

He also said a uni­fied com­mu­ni­ca­tion sys­tem was now in place between fed­er­al, state, and local law enforce­ment for events. Local police and Trump’s pro­tec­tive detail had not been able to com­mu­ni­cate on the same radio fre­quen­cy when local offi­cers spot­ted the gun­man on a near­by roof at the But­ler ral­ly.

Rowe also acknowl­edged, as he has on sev­er­al occa­sions, the Secret Service’s “abject fail­ure” at the ral­ly, which led to the pre­vi­ous direc­tor resign­ing.

At the event, Thomas Crooks climbed atop a build­ing few­er than 200 yards from Trump and opened fire while the pres­i­dent-elect was speak­ing to the crowd. Crooks killed one and injured two, while a bul­let grazed Trump’s ear. Crooks was then killed by a counter-sniper.

Two months lat­er, anoth­er man, Ryan Routh, was arrest­ed after aim­ing a loaded rifle toward Trump Inter­na­tion­al Golf Club in Flori­da as the pres­i­dent-elect was golf­ing. A Secret Ser­vice agent spot­ted Routh before he could get a shot off. Routh now faces charges of attempt­ing to assas­si­nate Trump.

Rep. Mike Kel­ly (R‑PA), the task force chair­man, praised Rowe for mak­ing what Kel­ly described as vis­i­ble improve­ments to the Secret Ser­vice.

The Secret Service’s per­for­mance dur­ing the Flori­da inci­dent “while not flaw­less, got the job done,” and at a sec­ond But­ler ral­ly in Octo­ber, Secret Ser­vice pro­tec­tion was the “dif­fer­ence between day and night” from the July ral­ly, Kel­ly said.

The task force has oper­at­ed in a ful­ly bipar­ti­san man­ner as it has inves­ti­gat­ed the two inci­dents, con­duct­ing dozens of inter­views and review­ing thou­sands of pages of doc­u­ments. The hear­ing itself, the sec­ond and final hear­ing for the pan­el before it dis­bands, was large­ly peace­ful, but it revert­ed for a moment to a loud scream­ing match between Rowe and Rep. Pat Fal­lon (R‑TX).