Protecting Trump.

0:00 Speaker 1 Well, Sunday morning, what’s going on. It’s been one hundred days since President Trump has become president again. And with us today to give us an update on what’s going on in the Secret Service is Don Muhallick. He was in the Secret Service for over twenty one years and he’s executive vice president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers

0:26 Association the Foundation, and well, Don give us an update. Things getting better? Are people getting better protected? Is the president getting better protected?

0:40 Speaker 2 Hey? John, it’s good to be with you. And that’s a great question. One hundred days in the President Trump, who came into office after two assassination attempts, who also has done some controversial stuff while in office, which has rubbed some people the wrong way, you know. For the Director Sean Kerhrn, who walked into office as the ultimate insider,

1:05 outsider being that he had never been in headquarters before and he was with President Trump and Butler Pennsylvania. His approach coming into the Secret Service was trying to do a top to bottom review, try to figure out what was working, what wasn’t working. He’s made some enhancements to the protective intelligence threat modeling that the Secret Service has done.

1:29 I know They’ve done a bunch of assessments on the protective details to make sure the details were staffed appropriately, that the White House complex was also upgraded in some fashions, or looking to upgrade the training center. And I believe they’re working with Congress to try to do a holistic funding upgrade for the Secret Service to make sure that

1:51 they can hire, recruit, and retain the right personnel, which the Super Bowl ad was the first big thing that the Secret Service did to try to recruit and retain the right type of Americans to serve this great nation as Secret Service agents. The threat matrix is pretty daunting.

2:10 We’ve seen threats metastasize and pop all over the place, including here domestically, and you know, for the Secret Service, they’re trying to make sure that they’re mitigating everything as they go. And I think in President Trump’s first hundred days they’ve they’ve had to work cut out for them.

2:28 But I think they’re doing what they need to do and make sure everybody stay.

2:32 Speaker 1 Safe, understood, And what other things can you can you tell that that’s public, because we don’t want you to tell any Secret Service about anything that the American people should know about. I mean, how many people are we protecting right now?

2:50 Speaker 2 Do you think, well, when President Trump was in office the last time, he’s got a big family, and then numbers around forty four D one protect these, which is pretty high for the Secret Service. A lot of these protectees are what the Secret Service with term is non traditional protectees, protectees that under law wouldn’t get protection, but

3:12 that are afforded protection by the President’s signature and the federal law. There’s very specific people that the Secret Service have to protect, the President, the vice president, former presidents, feign heads of state, those are mandated protection by law.

3:28 But then there’s a bunch of other individuals that are given protection by the President’s signature, to include grandchildren, the White House chief of Staff, the National Security Advisor, and a few others. What’s happened over the years post nine to eleven is that list of non traditional protectees has grown extensively, which has really put pressure on the Secret

3:51 Service and it’s protective model to try to make sure that they’re having the right level of protection and enough resources they have the protection for all these people. So that’s why that’s a continuing challenge under a Trump administration with a large, extensive family where the family tends to travel a lot, and you know, the family is not

4:12 afraid of controversy. So it really keeps the agents on their toes and it really is forcing the Student Service to really look at how they’re structured so they can better structure themselves to provide that that level of protection that’s needed for all of the all of the Trump family.

4:30 Speaker 1 Understood. So who did they change leadership in the Secret Service? On January twenty It’s when President Trump took OVID.

4:41 Speaker 2 Yeah, so the historic picture now of President Trump and Butler Pennsylvania after he gets shot. One of the individuals in the picture was President Trump’s detail leader at the time. His name is Sean Current. When the President Trump won won reelection, he decided to make Sean the director of the Secret Service. And we saw Sean again at the

5:07 address to Congress where he presented he presented a young child the Secret Service badge and made him a Secret Service Agent Honorary Secret Service Agent. His first initials were DJ. So Sean’s a pretty public, pretty active trying to make sure the Secret Service number one hiring people because they’ve had problem hiring people, and then on the backside trying

5:35 to make sure that the Secret Services resources and assets are in place, and we’re probably working a lot with the White House in Congress to make sure that the funding stream donor road comes to fruition that they need to really upgrade the agency.

5:51 Speaker 1 Well, thank you so much on this Sunday morning. Don Mhollick retired Secret Service, Senior Secret Service Agent in one years and now currently executive director in the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association twenty nine thousand members. You have, are any of them ready to go back to work?

6:15 Speaker 2 Well, Federal law enforcement was one of the few people that post COVID and through the COVID drama that are current at or IS. They actually had to be back at work because you can’t do fellow law enforcement from home.

6:29 So all of them were at work and continue to be at work, and a lot of them right now are down at the border doing enforcement operations either at the border or internally doing the immigration round up of all the criminal illegal allans. Under Tom Homan’s leadership, you’ve got agents of the FBI, the ATF, the DEA, you know,

6:50 working with ICE at HSI to make sure that we’re grabbing all these criminals and getting them out of the country, which was long overdue.

7:00 Speaker 1 Thank you for what you do keep our country safe and keep the American people informed of what’s going on. Our WABC is open to you anytime you need us, and thank you so much.

7:14 Speaker 2 Thanks for having me John, Always good to be with you.