The director of United States Secret Service abruptly resigned Wednesday in the face of multiple revelations of security breaches, bumbling in her agency and rapidly eroding confidence that President Barack Obama and his family were being kept safe.
Once highly respected for its professionalism, the Secret Service, which protects the president, his family, the vice president and former presidents, has been trying to rehabilitate its image since a 2012 prostitution scandal erupted during a presidential visit to Colombia.
That trust was shaken by a series of failures in the agency’s critical job of protecting the president, including a breach Sept. 19, when a knife-carrying man climbed over the White House fence and made it deep into the executive mansion before being stopped.
President Barack Obama “concluded new leadership of that agency was required,” said White House spokesman Josh Earnest.
A White House official told The Associated Press that the final straw was the revelation that Obama was never briefed about an incident in which he rode an elevator with an armed security contractor during a visit to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta just days before the White House breach.
Although Pierson offered her resignation without being asked, Obama had already told aides he thought she should go, the official said, adding that nobody put up any resistance when she offered to step down.
