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secret service
Secret Service Director Resigns After Trump Assassination Attempt
Kimberly Cheatle said in an email to colleagues that the agency "fell short" of its mission to protect U.S. leaders.
Jul 23, 2024
United States Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned Tuesday following the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania campaign rally and intense bipartisan grilling by members of a congressional committee.
The New York Timesreported that Cheatle—who led the Secret Service since September 2022—said in an internal email that the agency "fell short" of its mission to protect Trump, the Republican presidential nominee who was shot in the ear while speaking at a July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
"In light of recent events, it is with a heavy heart that I have made the difficult decision to step down as your director," Cheatle wrote.
Calls for Cheatle's resignation mounted following her Monday testimony before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, during which she acknowledged that "we failed" in "the Secret Service's solemn mission... to protect our nation's leaders."
Following the hearing, Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), who chairs the committee, and Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), the ranking member, issued a joint letter accusing Cheatle of failing "to provide answers to basic questions regarding that stunning operational failure" and calling on her to resign "as a first step to allowing new leadership to swiftly address this crisis and rebuild the trust of a truly concerned Congress and the American people."
In her resignation email, Cheatle told colleagues, "I do not want my calls for resignation to be a distraction from the great work each and every one of you do towards our vital mission."
Responding to Cheatle's resignation, Raskin said that "yesterday's Oversight Committee hearing identified two urgent priorities in the wake of the assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump and the accompanying mass shooting. The first was the need for Director Cheatle to step down... We accomplished that today."
"The other urgent need was to ban assault weapons to protect the rest of us from mass shootings like the one that took place in Butler," he added. "As I made clear during yesterday's hearing, a weapon that can be used to commit a mass shooting at an event under the full protection of the Secret Service and state and local police is a danger to schoolchildren; Walmart shoppers; and congregants in church, synagogue, and mosque services."
Twenty-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks used a legally purchased AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle to shoot Trump before he was killed by a Secret Service sniper. A rally attendee, Corey Comperatore, was fatally shot, and two other men were seriously injured by gunfire.
"As a weapon of war, the AR-15 has no legitimate place in our society," Raskin argued. "Congress must act now."
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'Violence Has No Place in American Life.' Except, Like, Everywhere You Look
A few thoughts on how the assassination attempt on Trump unleashed an orgy of Democratic platitudes.
Jul 16, 2024
The U.S. political system runs on the fuel of euphemism—the ability to conceal nefarious aspirations beneath the facade of idealistic slogans. Consider the U.S. Department of Corporate Violence (USDOCV) which, oddly, we have renamed the U.S. Department of Defense (USDOD). I use the word, renamed rather loosely, for The Department of Corporate Violence always required a pseudonym.
The public never became privy to the relationship between corporate greed and U.S. military adventure—at least not without some poking around beneath the surface. President Dwight Eisenhower warned us about the military industrial complex—an informal term that comes precariously close to letting the secret out of the bag.
Until 1949, the federal agency responsible for the U.S. military was simply called The Department of War—a rather nondescript, generic title that tells us nothing about intent. But with the advent of the Cold War and the new mandate to unleash military might against leftist regimes in every corner of the globe, our military needed a brand new identity. In 1949, just in time for decades of war in Southeast Asia, we decided to call our military The Department of Defense. This made it clear that bombing, defoliating and reducing civilian populations to ash thousands of miles from U.S. borders—in Korea, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia—were acts of "defense." The word defense had to go through conceptual contortions to befuddle the U.S. masses, but that is the nature of euphemistic language.
Why do we hear from politicians and media that they are shocked and horrified that someone took a shot at Donald Trump?
Many have ventured to assert that the U.S. is the most violent, militaristic nation in human history, both in terms of our astronomical military budget and our almost subliminal bombardment with pro-military, pro-police propaganda. It is easier in the U.S. to procure a firearm than it is to get a decent haircut or a high quality slice of pizza, and we shoot one another with such casual predictability that a mass shooting passes out of the news cycle faster than a celebrity divorce.
So why do we hear from politicians and media that they are shocked and horrified that someone took a shot at Donald Trump? We have been told, in the last few days, that "violence has no place in American life." It can't be just the usual embarrassment that U.S. leaders have about their blood-soaked deeds. I can count at least six Democrats who said the exact same lin—Biden, Obama, Schumer and three others whose names I have forgotten. Maybe it's a hundred Democrats who said this. We all lose track. "Violence has no place in American life."
Say what? Violence has such an enormous role in American existence that our government spends $3.1 billion annually to protect politicians from the armed-to-the-teeth citizens who despise them. That is right—the Secret Service budget is almost a third of the money allotted to the Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA, that Trump threatens to dismantle entirely, is responsible for putting up some sort of feeble resistance to the sixth extinction.
It is easier in the U.S. to procure a firearm than it is to get a decent haircut or a high quality slice of pizza, and we shoot one another with such casual predictability that a mass shooting passes out of the news cycle faster than a celebrity divorce.
Apparently, the $3.1 billion needed to protect our elected leaders from the AR-15 wielding hordes that dream of blowing their brains out is not enough. All it took was one distracted agent with his eyes on his Smart Phone—watching that Post Malone and Morgan Wallen video on YouTube, perhaps—and now the Secret Service budget might need more of your tax money than we use to keep a small percentage of our leaking neurotoxins away from your drinking water.
Out of slavish respect for our wounded former guy who takes offense at this point, the Democrats and the press are cautiously avoiding the elephant in the room: unregulated access to military grade weapons. These same Democrats are also falling all over themselves to proclaim their agonized grief over the shooting. After all, the rhetorical excesses—comparing Trump to Hitler just because Julius Streicher's words pour out of Trump's throat—was bound to encourage violence in an otherwise peace-loving country.
I have always suspected that the Republicans control the American narrative and the Democrats lip sync to the latest MAGA tunes. That is why Biden initiated an almost exact replica of MAGA's murderous immigration plans. The Democrats will crawl on their knees to prove that they have no ill intent toward Trump. Expect to hear many confessions of just how joyful they are about Trump's survival.
The issue is not to tamp down the rhetorical bile and show mutual respect. It is way too fucking late for that. We have two genocidal parties that both cater to corporations and engage in nasty political theater to amuse their bases, and we also have a pissed off, disempowered populace beleaguered by neurotoxins, and heavily armed. Too many Democrats, and even a few Republicans, are beseeching us to take the discourse "down a notch." That is like telling a heroin addict, shaking with cravings, to "just say no."
Nothing brings America together like a bipartisan orgy of military spending.
The flash flood of Democratic platitudes on behalf of civility and the parallel gushers of concern for Trump's welfare are a collective prostration to MAGA narratives. The Democrats are beside themselves with guilt for calling Trump a fascist or a Nazi wannabe. The Republicans accuse the Democrats of fomenting violence and the Democrats swear allegiance to the principles of Gandhi. In truth, violence and militarism are the true balm to heal our divided nation. Both parties love cops, guns and fighter planes. Nothing brings America together like a bipartisan orgy of military spending.
If you take away political drama, our entire system of governance would be naked and ashamed. The answer is to just spend more on Secret Service protection. Put an entire army battalion phalanx around Trump—and Biden too. The Secret Service budget is already the size of the entire NBA payroll. But we always have unlimited funding for police and military, so it should not be a problem. We never have enough money in America for housing, medical care, mental health or environmental cleanup, but a united Republican/Democratic lovefest can conjure money out of your taxes for enough nuclear warheads to obliterate the Milky Way.
As the U.S. descends into fascism there will be a lot of guns and police around. We better get used to it.
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After Setting Himself on Fire, US Airman Aaron Bushnell Dies Declaring 'Free Palestine'
"Many of us like to ask ourselves, 'What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?' The answer is, you're doing it."
Feb 26, 2024
"My name is Aaron Bushnell, I am an active-duty member of the United States Air Force, and I will no longer be complicit in genocide. I'm about to engage in an extreme act of protest, but compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonizers, it's not extreme at all."
That's how the 25-year-old from San Antonio introduced himself—and bade farewell—to the world in a livestream video of his Sunday afternoon walk to the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. Arriving outside the front gate, Bushnell set down his phone, took eight paces, turned to face the camera, doused himself in an unknown accelerant, donned his service cap, and set himself alight. He repeatedly screamed "Free Palestine" as he burned.
Uniformed Secret Service officers arrived on the scene even before Bushnell was able to ignite the fire. They repeatedly ordered him to "get on the ground."
"Get on the ground, you fucker," someone—presumably an officer—can be heard saying in the video as Bushnell screams and writhes in agony. He managed one final, garbled, yet unmistakable "free Palestine" as his body was engulfed in flames.
Note: The following video contains blurred graphic images that some readers may find disturbing.
Nearly two-and-a-half minutes into the video, an officer in a white shirt rushes in with an extinguisher while an officer points his pistol at Bushnell's burning body.
"I don't need guns," implored the man in the white shirt, "I need fire extinguishers."
NPRreported Bushnell was rushed to a hospital in critical condition. He died Sunday evening.
Bushnell left a final message on social media early Sunday morning.
"Many of us like to ask ourselves, 'What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?'" he wrote in his first Facebook post in nearly six years. "The answer is, you're doing it. Right now."
Some observers criticized U.S. corporate media outlets for publishing articles with headlines omitting the words "Gaza," "Palestine," or "genocide."
Others took aim at reports attributing Bushnell's act to mental health issues.
"They will try to spin-doctor it as mental health issues, but he was rational and clear about his political reasoning, which resonates with [the] majority of the world," Syracuse University professor Farhana Sultana said on social media. "May his sacrifice not be in vain. Indeed. it was legitimate moral outrage and courage against the holocaust and barbarity in Palestine with U.S. full participation. May his sacrifice not be in vain, may his last words on this earth ring true. #FreePalestine."
CounterPunch editor Joshua Frank wrote: "Please, stop saying Aaron Bushnell was mentally ill. The real mental illness is witnessing a genocide taking place and not doing a thing to stop it."
More than 100,000 Palestinians—mostly women and children—have been killed or wounded by Israeli bombs and bullets since the October 7 attacks on Israel. Around 90% of Gaza's 2.3 million people have been forcibly displaced, and at least hundreds of thousands of Gazans are on the brink of starvation.
The U.S. government backs Israel with nearly $4 billion in annual military aid and diplomatic support including three vetoes of United Nations Security Council cease-fire resolutions. The Biden administration is seeking an additional $14.3 billion in armed assistance for Israel, and has twice sidestepped Congress to fast-track emergency military aid.
Last month, The Interceptreported that documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request suggested that the Biden administration deployed a U.S. Air Force team to Israel to assist the Israel Defense Forces with targeting intelligence.
Bushnell's death is the second reported U.S. self-immolation since the start of the Gaza genocide. On December 1, a woman—whose identity and outcome remain unknown—carrying a Palestinian flag was hospitalized in critical condition after setting herself alight outside the Israeli consulate in Atlanta.
Police called it an "act of extreme political protest." Israeli Consul-General Anat Sultan-Dadon called it an act of "hate and incitement toward Israel."
People have set themselves on fire as an act of political protest for many centuries. Following the examples of Vietnamese Buddhist monks and nuns who self-immolated in 1963 to protest persecution by the U.S.-backed Ngô Đình Diệm dictatorship, at least half a dozen Americans burned themselves to death to protest the Vietnam War. Americans also self-immolated over the 1991 and 2003 invasions of Iraq, the climate emergency, alleged corruption at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and other reasons.
In December 2010, the self-immolation of Tunisian street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi was a major catalyst for the Arab Spring uprising that swept across North Africa and the Middle East.
The late Vietnamese Buddhist monk, peace activist, and author Thích Nhất Hạnh explained in a letter to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. that the monks and nuns who self-immolated were not committing suicide. Rather, their self-sacrifices were aimed "at moving the hearts of the oppressors, and at calling the attention of the world to the suffering endured."
"It is done," he explained, "to wake us up."
The 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline—which offers 24/7, free, and confidential support—can be reached by calling or texting 988, or through chat at 988lifeline.org.
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