Speaking in testimony before Congres, highly popular podcast host and former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino sounded off on the agency for which he used to work, tearing into it for what he characterized as a failure of leadership in its not appearing to heed previous warnings about the situation, particularly that a lack of certain things was putting lives at risk.
The hearing during which Bongino was speaking was one in which a bipartisan group of lawmakers probed the July 13th assassination attempt of former President Donald Trump, investigating how a 20-year-old gunman with no prior service record was able to amble past agents and officers and get on a roof within two hundred yards of where the former president was speaking.
Speaking during his appearance on the floor of Congress in five minutes of testimony, the former Secret Service agent called out the Secret Service for its history of using old technology. He said, “The joke in the Secret Service, which is sadly no longer funny when I was there, and it wasn’t funny then either, is they rely on yesterday’s technology tomorrow.”
Explaining that the agency can’t be expected to do “more with less” when it comes to budgetary resources and the ability to buy new technology, Mr. Bongino said that the approach the Secret Service is supposed to use is incoherent nonsense. He said, “There isn’t more with less, there is less with less. The Secret Service more-with-less approach only works if you produce more.”
Continuing, he compared the Secret Service with what he characterized as a small budget to a television producer that sells yesterday’s products for a fraction of the price for which they were originally sold, Bongino told the members of Congress to whom he spoke that the Service “was given more money, and produced less.”
For reference, the Secret Service’s budget has shot up by nearly half in a decade, ballooning from $2.34 billion in 2014 to $3.62 billion in 2024. Bongino, in any case, kept sounding off on the budget and the idea that they’re supposed to “do more with less.” He said, “A 20-year-old criminal outsmarted them on a drone technology piece of device. You’re telling me that’s more with less? That’s disgusting.” He added, “That’s less with more.”
Bongino also added that the Secret Service is overstretched due to its also having to deal with counterfeiting, and that “Their agents are talented, smart people. They can figure out how to do protection without running down cheap $20 counterfeit notes at 7-Eleven on a Friday night while the president is getting shot in the head.”
Speaking about the rooftop issue and why he thinks something went wrong there, Bongino said, “That post, according to my source, that roof was supposed to be a police post. It was supposed to be someone there. They’re now making up excuses, saying the pitch of the roof… my source says to me, no one knows why the post didn’t show up.”
Mr. Bongino also spoke about what is going on; according to his sources have informed him that the director of the Secret Service has apparently been told to keep quiet on the matter to keep her job. He said, “I was also told that the USSS director has been given instructions from the administration and the DHS secretary: ‘If you wanna keep your job, you’ll keep your mouth shut about this.’”
Director Cheatle, for reference, recently issued a much-mocked explanation for why the rooftop wasn’t covered, saying, “That building in particular has a sloped roof at its highest point. And so, you know, there’s a safety factor that would be considered there that we wouldn’t want to put somebody up on a sloped roof.” She added, “And so, you know, the decision was made to secure the building, from inside.”
Bongino, in any case, said, speaking about the roof and the possible consequences for Trump, said, “They’re not putting that out there. But if you get those site post logs and those police instructions and it was a post on there and they didn’t show up and no one checked, someone could have got your dad killedl.” Bongino added, “Within millimeters.”
