House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi says she backs an initial call from a senior House Democrat that beleaguered Secret Service Director Julia Pierson resign.
“If [House Oversight and Government Reform Committee ranking member Elijah] Cummings thinks that she should go, I subscribe to his recommendation,” she said.
“If you follow up and [ask] me why she should leave, I don’t have the knowledge that he has. So I am subscribing to his superior judgment and knowledge on the subject.”
But Pelosi added the Secret Service’s problems run deeper than Pierson and has called for an independent investigation of the agency.
“An independent investigation is what is needed, not just to hold people accountable but to see how we should go forward,” the California Democrat told reporters. “This is more than one person, because there were problems before she went there.”
Pierson told the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Tuesday that she took responsibility for a September incident in which a Texas Army veteran with a knife jumped the White House fence and was able to make it deep into the executive mansion before being stopped.
Later in the day, the Washington Examiner reported that President Obama rode an elevator last month with an armed security contractor who had three criminal convictions, a violation of Secret Service security protocols.
Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the top Democrat on the committee, initially Wednesday suggested Pierson resign.
“I have come to the conclusion that my confidence and my trust in this director, Ms. Pierson, has eroded,” Cummings told MSNBC Wednesday morning. “And I do not feel comfortable with her in that position.”
But hours later, Cummings walked back his comments, posting on Twitter that he hasn’t decided if Pierson should leave her post.
Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a member of the oversight panel, was more blunt about Pierson’s future with the Secret Service, telling Fox News she should be fired.
This isn’t the agency’s first recent brush with trouble, as agents were involved in a prostitution scandal in Colombia in 2012, a situation Pelosi called “disgusting” but “minor” compared with the agency’s current woes.
“This is important and it has to be dealt with … because the protection of the president and his security is of the utmost importance to us,” she said.
