During a House Oversight Committee hearing on Monday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) questioned President Joe Biden’s Secret Service chief Kimberly Cheatle about the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania. The congresswoman expressed concern over the Secret Service’s protective perimeter at the event being shorter than the range of an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle, which can shoot up to 600 yards away.
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez cited the fact that the building from where Thomas Matthew Crooks allegedly shot President Trump was approximately 200 yards away from the stage. She asked, “Why is the Secret Service protective perimeter shorter than one of the most popular semi-automatic weapons in the United States?” The congresswoman also criticized the agency’s failure to publicly account for these questions and others posed by Congress as unacceptable.
In response, Cheatle stated that there are a number of weapons with varying ranges and that several factors are taken into account when determining a protective perimeter, such as terrain, buildings, and available resources. She emphasized that every event and venue is different and treated accordingly, adding that the building where Crooks shot President Trump was outside their secure perimeter.
Following this hearing, Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned on Tuesday, one day after she was unable or unwilling to answer many key questions posed by lawmakers about the agency’s failure to prevent the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump during his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.