An Analysis of The Secret Service

CAROL LEONNIG, AUHOR, “ZERO FALL: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE SECRET SERVICE: It has been in a steady decline, Bianna, since basically a few years after 9/11. It hasn’t — it’s been stretched too thin, it’s been shortchanged, it has incredibly noble, dedicated public servants who entrusted a lot of secrets to me because they want to ring the alarm bell. They are worried about a president being killed on their watch and they feel that the chinks in the armor around the Secret Service need attention desperately, need attention immediately.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA: And when you compare sort of the two monumental moments with the assassination of JFK and then some 18 years later, the attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan, I believe we have video showing Agent Tim McCarthy taking literally a bullet for the president, juxtaposing that with what happened prior with assassination of JFK, you talk about just the traumatic impact it had on the agency, on agents themselves, and really forced them to take a look at the future of the agency and make some big reforms. Can you compare and contrast the two assassinations and the assassination attempt?

LEONNIG: You know, that’s absolutely right, Bianna. Assassination of Kennedy was a tragedy and a trauma for all of America and actually, across the world but it was a gut punch like no other for the Secret Service. And you know, the director at the time, Jim Rowley, he basically rededicated his entire life to rebuilding that agency, professionalizing the training, so that when there is a shot, there is a hair trigger reflex for every single agent. Instead of looking back over their shoulder as they did with Kennedy in Dealey Plaza, they have instant reaction. And that professionalization and that intensive training that happened after Kennedy was killed is vindicated when you see the videos of the attempt to kill President Reagan. The Secret Service showed that it was up to the task and that all of the work and all of that rebuilding was so worth it. I mean, literally, Tim McCarthy does what every agent had been trained for, to step between a bullet and the president and take it. He instantly does that upon the first shot from John Hinckley. And Jerry Parr, detail leader for the president, also within a second of hearing gunshots, instead of looking around to see what that is.