WASHINGTON (NEXSTAR) — Secret Service Acting Director Ronald Rowe testified Thursday before the bipartisan House task force investigating the assassination attempts against President-elect Donald Trump.
The House hearing turned into a screaming match.
Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Texas) questioned why Rowe was closest to the president at the September 11th memorial, instead of his detail.
Rowe was in the hot seat from the beginning.
“The level of the the failure seems unfathomable,” Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.) said.
Rowe faced questions about the July shooting that injured President-elect Trump and killed a Western Pennsylvania firefighter.
“Our agency is not defined by one failure, but by our ability to learn from mistakes,” Rowe said.
The hearing comes as the task force is wrapping up its work and is preparing to issue a final report.
“America deserved answers and America’s getting those answers,” Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) said.
Crow and Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) lead the committee.
“When you look at the finished product, it came out exactly the way we thought it should have,” Kelly said.
Kelly says the report will layout solutions ranging from a flawed setup, agents failing to speak up about problems they observed and training issues.
The committee’s report is due within the next week.
