Congressman Biggs Introduces Legislation to Prioritize Protective Mission of United States Secret Service

Today, Congressman Andy Biggs (R-AZ) introduced the Secret Service Prioritization Act of 2024, legislation to refocus United States Secret Service (USSS) efforts on its protective mission—USSS’s primary responsibility. Congressman Biggs’s bill will transfer non-protective responsibilities, such as the investigation of financial crimes like counterfeiting, to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) under President Trump and his FBI Director. 

The Secret Service Prioritization Act implements a major recommendation from the DHS Independent Review Panel’s October 15, 2024 Report on the Assassination Attempt in Butler Pennsylvania. The report noted the Panel’s “extreme skepticism that many of the Service’s non protective (investigative) missions meaningfully contribute to the Service’s protective capability and is concerned that they may materially distract from it.” 

Further, the report stated: 

Whatever else the Secret Service may do, its core, essential, and unique mission is to protect its protectees, including the president, vice president, and nominees for president in an election. No other federal law enforcement agency can discharge this duty. And the duty is a zero-failure mission. All assets should be allocated to that mission before any other tasks—including law enforcement responsibility for financial frauds, for example, or perhaps law enforcement duties entirely—are undertaken. There is simply no excuse to “do more with less” concerning protection of national leaders; unless and until those responsibilities are fulfilled, no resources (funds or time) should be allocated to other missions that are not centrally related to the protective function. 

USSS must be the top governmental protection agency in the world, and the near-assassination of President Donald Trump on July 13, 2024, proved that it has failed its no-fail mission. USSS’s $3.1 billion budget and 3,200 special agents must be properly allocated to ensure that non-protective measures do not take priority over the primary duty to protect current and former presidents, vice presidents, and presidential nominees.

Testimony from other federal law enforcement agencies makes clear that the Secret Service’s current dual mission diverts Secret Service agents trained for protective operations away from that mission, while the USSS utilizes personnel from other law enforcement agencies to backfill. In a September hearing with the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Federal Government Surveillance, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Executive Associate Director Katrina Berger testified that HSI provided over 700,000 hours of assistance—costing over $23.3 million—to USSS from 2020 to September 2024. HSI agents tasked on these missions are provided a virtual training prior to deploying to supplement a USSS workforce fully trained in protection, but splitting time between protective and investigative missions. This is unacceptable. While USSS retains under this legislation the ability to draw on the resources of other agencies in furtherance of its protective mission, USSS must focus all of its resources on that mission first. 

Secret Service agents are among the bravest and most selfless individuals in the nation. Congress must ensure that the USSS is exclusively focused on its zero-fail protective mission to ensure the safety of both agents and their protectees.

“July 13, 2024, was a wake-up call to the failures of the Secret Service,” said Congressman Biggs.

“In no world should an agency with a budget of $3+ billion and 3,200 specialized agents fail to protect the life of one of the most influential figures in the world. The failures of July 13 illustrate the necessity to strip non-protective responsibilities from the Secret Service to ensure it is focused on the execution of its primary duty.

“Now that President Trump’s FBI will be shifting away from weaponization against American citizens, they will be fully equipped to take on Secret Service’s non-protective, investigative functions It’s imperative that House Leadership move this legislation quickly through the House to ensure that no event like July 13 is ever able to occur again.”

“The Secret Service should have a singular focus on protection. Many failures have been exposed over the last six months and I’m proud to join Rep. Biggs in introducing legislation that seeks to fix one of them,” said Congressman Eli Crane (R-AZ).

Cosponsors of this legislation are: Rep. Eli Crane (R-AZ) and Rep. Cory Mills (R-FL).

RealClearPolitics covered the legislation here.

The bill may be read here.