More Secret Service Issues?
We’ve all seen the recent news stories about salacious misbehavior by members of the Secret Service. Well, apparently there just might be a bit more history there. Bad history.
Seems that there are numerous accusations of misconduct involving Secret Service personnel over the past several years. While many of these accusations appear to be unfounded, others don’t.
Yes, the Secret Service is a large organization (about 4400 personnel) – so a few “duds” will slip thru screening. And yes, some of it seems to be overblown.
But at least some the alleged misconduct seems to be significant – the apparently substantiated allegations seem to include disclosure of sensitive information. The number of substantiated incidents appears not to be inconsequential. And the Secret Service is purportedly carefully screened.
Maybe there really is a problem in that agency.
Category: Pointless blather
It’s possible. I don’t know what the rate of washouts are without visibility…..
BUT one wonders if all this time under the DHS and our most stellar Executive Branch if recruiting standards or ethic standards weren’t relaxed. The difference between a real patrol and a foxhole patrol called in by radio.
There’s also more than one unit within the USSS. The public face of the USSS are the VIP bodyguards. Then there’s their support staff – these folks are where the troubles seem to lie. All the same service, but not the good men and women who protect our VIP.
OBO divide and conquer
Dave, are the uniformed division personnel selected and trained differently from the Men In Black secret service personnel? If so does there seem to be more misconduct with them than the special agents? I hope the selection and training hasn’t gone the way of the TSA.
Just another witch hunt from Congress because it’s an election year.
Agents and UD officers are trained separtely and have different hiring requirements.
#4 Ann,
I don’t know for sure. If how other agencies select their special agents is similar to the USSS, then yes.
#6 – It’s not.
Edward 1811 – I think DaveO was saying that the two training regimes are not the same (Ann’s original question was whether the uniformed and non-uniformed Secret Service were trained differently). Are you saying that they are trained similarly, or are you agreeing with DaveO that they are trained differently?
I’m not trying to “bust balls” here – I really am not sure what you’re saying, and your answer could be taken two different ways.
Edward1811 – thanks. I don’t know how Commerce runs their business.
Secret Service’s 229-page log reveals agents’ porn, wiretap, embezzlement and drunken misdeeds. The Secret Service traveling road show is dubbed the “Secret Circus”. Want to know when that moniker was coined? Around early 1960’s. President JFK’s advance SS protection team got to Dallas in November 1963 and almost immediately started boozing at bars and cohorting w/strippers.Everything went back to hotel rooms for rowdy gay old time to early wee morning hours.
Former Agent Ronald Kessler has stated in interviews that SS agents are not being required to pass firearms skill tests or physical fitness assessments. He was shocked to discover some agents are noticeably obese and have difficulty with even moderate physical exertion.
Here are NY Post excerpts:
In one 2005 incident, a drunken agent was yanked from his role as the “detail leader” for a team assigned to protect the visiting president of the Dominican Republic.
Another agent, with a blood-alcohol level above the legal limit, was arrested in Los Angeles after driving into a ditch.
In an August 2011 incident, an employee was accused of pushing a woman who also worked for the agency onto a bed during a work trip. The employee “got on top of [censored] attempting to have sex,” even though the woman “told [censored] ‘no’ several times.”
They also included an anonymous complaint in October 2003 that a Secret Service agent “may have been involved with a prostitution ring.” It noted that two telephone numbers belonging to the agent, who has since retired, turned up as part of an FBI investigation into a prostitution ring.
In addition, in 2005, an employee was reported to the Washington field office for being arrested on a charge of solicitation in a park.
In 2008, an on-duty uniform-division officer was arrested in a Washington prostitution sting. The officer, who was driving a marked Secret Service vehicle at the time, was placed on administrative leave, the records show.
DaveO, I misread your comment. I thought you meant they were trained the same, my mistake.
Devtun, what exactly is your point?
Director of Secret Service Mark J. Sullivan testified before the Senate and said “I’m confident this is not a cultural issue. This is not a systemic issue with us,” said Sullivan,
Now Director Sullivan is boxed in and having tough time with
new incidents revealed one after another-some just mere months prior. What’s the point? Director Sullivan might be asking that right about now. Play ostrich, head in sand & pretend nothing ever happened.