Kimberly Cheatle, the director of the U.S. Secret Service, resigned on July 23, one day after her testimony before Congress about the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
“I take full responsibility for the security lapse,” she said in the email to Secret Service staff. “In light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to step down as your director.”
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas soon after said he was appointing Ronald Rowe, the service’s deputy director, to serve as acting director.
Ms. Cheatle, who was sworn in as director in 2022, had previously rebuffed calls to resign in the wake of the assassination attempt against the former president.
“I think I am the best person to lead the Secret Service at this time,” she said during a Capitol Hill hearing on July 22.
The former president was struck in the ear during a Pennsylvania rally on July 13 by a bullet fired by a shooter from on top of a nearby building. Secret Service agents weren’t on the roof because it was sloped, Ms. Cheatle has said.
Additional bullets hit other people at the rally, killing one and wounding two.
“If you have an assassination attempt on a president, or a candidate, you need to resign,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) said.
During the hearing, Ms. Cheatle acknowledged the Secret Service was alerted before the rally started to a suspicious person but said the man, who ended up being the shooter, wasn’t deemed a threat until moments before shots were fired.
Ms. Cheatle acknowledged the assassination attempt was the agency’s “most significant operational failure” in decades, but she said she was the right person to helm the Secret Service to ensure accountability. She rankled lawmakers by repeatedly refusing to discuss specifics of what went wrong during the rally and not committing to firing any personnel once the agency’s internal probe wraps up.
The service’s probe is expected to take 60 days, according to Ms. Cheatle.
She also revealed that the roof from which the shooter opened fire had been identified as a potential vulnerability in the days before the rally.
“As the director of the United States Secret Service, I take full responsibility for any security lapse,” Ms. Cheatle told lawmakers.
“I’m happy to see that she has heeded the call of both Republicans and Democrats. Now, we have to pick up the pieces; we have to rebuild the American people’s faith and trust in the Secret Service as an agency,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters at the Capitol on July 23.
“Director Cheatle’s resignation will do nothing to stop our oversight efforts or the broader Congressional investigation—nor does it magically resolve all the problems and lapses that led to the massive security failure of July 13,” Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said in a statement.
President Joe Biden, who had declined to terminate Ms. Cheatle, said in a statement that he thanked her “for answering the call to lead the Secret Service.”
He added, “As a leader, it takes honor, courage, and incredible integrity to take full responsibility for an organization tasked with one of the most challenging jobs in public service.”
President Biden has ordered an independent review of what transpired on July 13. He said he looks forward to seeing the review’s conclusions.
Ms. Cheatle served in the Secret Service for 27 years. She left in 2021 for a job as a security executive at PepsiCo before President Biden asked her to return in 2022 to head the agency with a workforce of about 8,000.
When the president announced Ms. Cheatle’s appointment, he said she had served on his detail when he was vice president and that he and his wife “came to trust her judgment and counsel.”
