House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) on Wednesday called on Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle to resign in the wake of the attempted assassination of former President Trump.
Johnson also said he will create a congressional task force to consolidate investigations into security failures surrounding Saturday’s Trump rally, which resulted in a 20-year-old gunman injuring the president, killing one attendee and leaving two others in limbo. critical condition.
“I’m going to resign as well,” Johnson told Fox News when asked if Cheatle should resign. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) called for his resignation Tuesday.
“I think it’s inexcusable,” Johnson said.
He referred to Cheatle saying in an interview with ABC News that there were no law enforcement officers stationed on the roof from which the shooter fired because the “slanted roof” created security concerns, despite other Secret Service snipers being positioned on a roof that also it was inclined.
“That doesn’t work, and I think she’s shown what her priorities are,” Johnson said. “I don’t know her personally, but we’ll be asking a lot of questions.”
Cheatle also told ABC News that she would not resign.
At least six committees in both chambers of Congress have been investigating the assassination attempt, with the various investigations fueling tensions with the Secret Service and the Department of Homeland Security.
Johnson said the creation of a House task force will speed up investigations.
“We will move quickly. I will be creating a task force on Monday, a special task force within the Chamber,” said Johnson. “And the reason we’re going to do this is because it’s more of a precision strike.”
The task force will not have as many “procedural hurdles” and will have “subpoena authority,” Johnson said, and will have both Republicans and Democrats.
Johnson said he spoke with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and FBI leaders and Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines.
“There are real issues, let’s put it that way,” Johnson said. “The answers didn’t appear. I think they are collecting data, let’s do that too. We have to take responsibility for this. It was inexcusable. Obviously, there were security breaches. You don’t need to be a special operations expert to understand this.”
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
