Trump assassination attempt puts Secret Service funding in question: Americans ‘deserve answers’
Funding for the U.S. Secret Service for Fiscal Year 2025 has come into question as lawmakers continue to investigate an assassination attempt against former President Trump at his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, that left one man dead and two others wounded.
"Despite the quick actions of Secret Service agents, this attack resulted in the death of Corey Comperatore, serious injuries to two other attendees, and a bullet coming within an inch of killing the former [p]resident," Democratic Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy and Republican Alabama Sen. Katie Britt wrote in a letter to Acting Secret Service (USSS) Director Ronald Rowe on Wednesday.
The Senate Committee on Appropriations and Subcommittee on Homeland Security pulled a planned markup for Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding to allow lawmakers additional time to discuss the Secret Service's monetary needs and to reach a bipartisan consensus on other issues the committees are currently considering, according to Murphy's office.
Murphy and Britt sent the letter to Rowe presenting questions about how USSS has allocated DHS funding to carry out its mission to protect current and former presidents, other political leaders and their families.
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"What happened to President Trump in Pennsylvania should never have happened," Britt said in a Wednesday post on X. "The American people and Congress deserve answers from the Secret Service before we write them a check. With Senator Murphy, as bipartisan leaders of the Senate Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, I’m working to get those answers."
Last year, Congress allocated more than $3 billion to the USSS, according to a July 2024 report from the Congressional Research Service. Meanwhile, staffing has fallen slightly from a high of 7,811 USSS employees in 2021 to 7,689 employees in 2023, according to the report.
Murphy and Britt note in their letter that $190 million of that funding was specifically designated to protections for the 2024 presidential campaign, "plus an additional $22 million above President Biden's budget request for protection related travel costs."
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"Despite this increase," the letter states, "in mid-June, prior to the attempted assassination, the Secret Service submitted a reprogramming notification to our subcommittee detailing its intent to shift $19 million to cover a shortfall for protection-related travel funding."
As the USSS takes on more responsibility, questions about whether the agency has sufficient funding to fulfill its mission have come into question, the senators said.
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The subcommittee is seeking answers regarding how USSS has "obligated" the funding Congress provided the agency in 2024 to protecting the 2024 presidential campaign, whether the agency provided the same level of protection to Trump's July 13 rally as it did Biden's rally in Michigan the day prior, whether the Secret Service denied requests for additional personnel from the Trump campaign, and if the USSS is "projecting any funding shortfalls for Fiscal Year 2024."
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Fox News Digital has reached out to USSS for a response to the letter.