Bipartisan lawmakers push to remove Secret Service from DHS after Trump assassination attempts
FIRST ON FOX: A pair of House lawmakers are seeking a major change to the Secret Service after heightened scrutiny following the third assassination attempt against President Donald Trump in...
By Fox News · Fox News
FIRST ON FOX: A pair of House lawmakers are seeking a major change to the Secret Service after heightened scrutiny following the third assassination attempt against President Donald Trump in April. Reps. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., and Russell Fry, R-S.C., introduced legislation Thursday that would transfer the Secret Service from DHS supervision and make the agency a direct report to the White House. The measure is part of a broader package of bipartisan reforms that Moskowitz, a former emergency management director, is unveiling to reform the sprawling department that has come under frequent criticism for bureaucratic dysfunction. His legislative package would also make FEMA an independent cabinet-level agency and move TSA under the jurisdiction of the Department of Transportation. The goal, Moskowitz said, is to cut red tape at DHS that impedes its subagencies’ ability to function — an observation he saw up close as a member of the congressional task force investigating the first assassination attempt against Trump in Butler, Pa. TRUMP BUTLER RALLY SECRET SERVICE TEAM FAILED MULTIPLE BASIC PROTOCOLS BEFORE ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT, DOCS REVEAL "Going to Butler, talking to Secret Service, is when I realized, well, the Secret Service is suffering the same problems that FEMA is suffering," Moskowitz said in an interview with Fox News Digital. "Because they were such a small agency, they couldn't get the resources they needed. They couldn't get decisions being made." "These pieces of legislation would streamline all three of those agencies," Moskowitz added. "It would cut a lot of the bureaucracy we're getting at DHS." Moskowitz, who was present at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, during which the Secret Service subdued the alleged shooter, said the assassination scare reinforced the need to make the agency directly accountable to the president and provide agents with "more resources, not less." Fry, who is co-leading the bill, said the measure would better allow t…