Raskin and Comer Call on Secret Service Director to Resign Over Trump Assassination Attempt

Ahmad Austin Jr.Jul 22nd, 2024, 4:40 pm
 

Reps. Jamie Raskin (D-MD) and James Comer (R-KY) both called for the resignation of Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle following the attempted assassination of Donald Trump — a moment of bipartisan agreement on Capitol Hill.

The House Oversight Committee held a hearing on Monday to examine the Secret Service’s role in the shooting at Trump’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Hours into the contentious session, Raskin concluded that the “irretrievable” relationship between Cheatle and Congress was grounds for her resignation.

“What is depressing is the extraordinary communications gap between the director of the Secret Service and Congress,” Raskin said, “and I don’t want to add to the director’s terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad day, but I will be joining the Chairman [Comer] in calling for the resignation of the director, just because I think that this relationship is irretrievable at this point; and I think that the director has lost the confidence of Congress at a very urgent and tender moment in the history of the country and we need to very quickly move beyond this.”

After those remarks, Comer and Raskin signed and published a letter calling for Cheatle’s resignation.

“Today, you failed to provide answers to basic questions regarding that stunning operational failure and to reassure the American people that the Secret Service has learned its lessons and begun to correct its systemic blunders and failures,” Comer said. “In the middle of a presidential election, the Committee and the American people demand serious institutional accountability and transparency that you are not providing. We call on you to resign as Director as a first step to allowing new leadership to swiftly address this crisis and rebuild the trust of a truly concerned Congress and the American people.”

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