Kimberly Cheatle, director of the U.S. Secret Service, said she will not resign from her role after what she called the “unacceptable” assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump at his campaign rally in Pennsylvania.
In an interview with ABC, Cheatle said the attack on Saturday is “something that shouldn’t happen again.”
Cheatle said she understood her responsibility as the director of the Secret Service but refused to step down, telling ABC she would not resign from her post.
“The buck stops with me,” Cheatle said. “I am the director of the Secret Service, and I need to make sure that we are performing a review and that we are giving resources to our personnel as necessary.”
Bullets rang out at the Trump campaign event in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Saturday, with one hitting the former president in the ear in an assassination attempt. One rallygoer — a husband, father, and firefighter — was struck fatally, and two other attendees were injured.
“It was obviously a situation that as a Secret Service agent, no one ever wants to occur in their career,” Cheatle said.
Calls for Cheatle’s resignation come after the Secret Service did not adequately prepare for the protection of Trump and rallygoers. As The Federalist’s John Daniel Davidson wrote, “As far as sniper assassination attempts go, this might be the most telegraphed attack in history”:
Olivia Rinaldi of CBS News posted on X Monday evening that snipers were stationed inside the building where the would-be assassin staged his attack. They saw him beforehand, outside looking
