Senators scrutinize Secret Service spending after Trump shooting
WASHINGTON — Senators have asked whether the Secret Service needs more funding in the wake of the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump, which appears to have contributed to the delay on a Homeland Security spending bill.
The top legislators on the Senate Appropriations subcommittee for Homeland Security — Sens. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. and Katie Britt, R, Ala. — told the acting director of the Secret Service in a letter that it was “critical” to understand the agency’s needs to set fiscal 2025 funding levels.
They asked a series of questions about the protection costs for the duration of the 2024 presidential election and requested answers by Wednesday.
Among them: Whether insufficient resources contributed to the security failure at the Trump rally in Pennsylvania, if the Secret Service has any funding shortfalls in the current fiscal year that ends Sept. 30, and what additional funds might be needed in fiscal 2025 for “the protection of presidential candidates, existing protectees, the election certification, and the Inauguration?”
The agency in June had detailed its intent to shift $19 million to cover a shortfall for protection-related travel funding, the senators wrote. After the assassination attempt, the agency also will provide protection to Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and two vice-presidential candidates.
The senators wrote that “the Secret Service is assuming new protection costs related to the campaign at a time when it already appears to lack sufficient resources to fulfill its protective mission.”
The Homeland Security spending bill is the only fiscal 2025 appropriations title that the Senate Appropriations Committee has not advanced. It was initially set for a markup last month but pulled from consideration.
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La, a member of the Appropriations Committee’s homeland security panel, told CQ Roll Call that he was told the delay “has to do with funding for Secret Service,” although he conceded other factors may be in play.
The letter comes on the heels of a joint hearing where senators on the Judiciary Committee and Homeland Security Committee posed tough questions for the new acting Secret Service director, Ronald Rowe, Jr.
Senators on both sides pressed Rowe on resources. Sen. Richard J. Durbin, D-Ill, questioned why Congress has doubled the Secret Service budget over the past 10 fiscal years but the number of agents in protective operations has fallen about 9 percent, from 4,027 to 3,671.
Rowe said the Secret Service has rigorous standards and only 2 percent of every applicant pool makes it through the hiring process, while many decide to leave the agency because of rigorous demands or are poached by outside business seeking talent. That said, Rowe concluded the agency for the first time in years expects to end 2024 “on the positive of 200 plus agents.”
At the hearing, Sen. Lindsey Graham concluded the agents are overtaxed and merit additional funds. “I would encourage you to think big when it comes to resourcing the department in light of what happened here,” Graham told Rowe.
Graham, in an interview Thursday, echoed his vision for the need for additional funds to make sure Secret Service can complete its mission. “Yeah I think we need to have a surge in personnel, a surge in funding and move them back to Treasury,” Graham said.
Secret Service has already enjoyed a robust funding increase. Congress appropriated more than 9 percent increase for overall Secret Service operations in fiscal 2024, to nearly $3.1 billion, exceeding President Joe Biden’s request by $78 million. Adjusted for inflation, that’s a larger budget than any year previously during a presidential election.
Republican questions
The need for additional Secret Service funding in the wake of the assassination has divided Republicans, with some senators not eager to embrace Graham’s plan and House GOP leaders have signaled they have no appetite for it.
House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James R. Comer, R-Ky., said last month on “Fox News Sunday” the $3.1 billion budget is the right amount for Secret Service given its relatively small size, while Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said on CNN the agency could have shifted resources if needed.
Kennedy, speaking with reporters on Thursday, said he wouldn’t support at this time an increase in funds for the Secret Service, but suggested that could change.
“We don’t know, yet,” Kennedy said. “I mean, the problem I have right now with more funding is some members of the Secret Service saved President Trump, other members clearly screwed up. And in the real world, when you screw up, you get fired. In Washington DC, when you screw up, you automatically get more money because you obviously need it. That’s the attitude. I wouldn’t vote to give more money for Secret Service today. I want the facts of what happened, and I don’t think I’m the only person who feels that way.”
Kennedy concluded: “I think if the bill had been brought up without having addressed this issue, it would have been defeated.”
Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., said he would like to see a reallocation of funds within the department before he would be willing to support more money for the agency.
And Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., a member of the Homeland Security Committee, said he wants to know more about the dwindling manpower at the agency that Durbin raised at the hearing this week.
“I’d like to know why it is first that Secret Service has reduced their manpower as the budget has been increasing,” Hawley said. “I didn’t hear an answer to that in the hearing on Tuesday. Chairman Durban asked specifically why it is Secret Service manpower has been reduced by 1000-plus agents in the field as the budget’s nearly doubled.”