Biden administration will expand Secret Service protection to independent presidential candidates Robert F. Kennedy Jr.Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said Monday.
In addition, “adjustments” have been made to the president’s security. Joe BidenVice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trumpsaid Mayorkas, who declined to reveal details. Sen. J.D. Vance, as Trump’s vice presidential nominee, will have “the appropriate level of security,” Mayorkas added.
The decision comes two days after Trump was the target of an assassination attempt that left one person dead and two others injured.
Biden continues to have confidence in Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said. And Mayorkas also expressed “100 percent confidence” in the agency and in Cheatle, though he acknowledged that the shooting was a failure of the Secret Service’s mission to protect presidential candidates.
“What you saw on the stage … is exactly what the American public should see every day,” Mayorkas said of the immediate response to the shots, which saw officers knock Trump to the ground and then remove him from the scene shortly afterward.
The government’s independent investigation into Saturday’s shooting, which Biden announced over the weekend, will “examine the actions of the Secret Service and other law enforcement officials before, during and after the shooting,” Mayorkas said.
The administration is still deciding who will lead the investigation, and Mayorkas did not give a specific timeline for wrapping up the investigation, saying only that he expected it to be up and running within days. But he said any conclusions would be made public.
“We must act quickly and urgently because this is a security emergency,” he said.
Mayorkas also condemned conspiracy theories that have emerged around the attack, calling suggestions that Biden or Democrats were involved “ridiculous.”
“It is also dangerous to spread rumors that are so unequivocally false and provocative,” he said.
