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News > World

US Secret Service Director Resigns

  • U.S. Secret Service Director Julia Pierson testifies at the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on

    U.S. Secret Service Director Julia Pierson testifies at the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on "White House Perimeter Breach. (Photo: Reuters/Kevin Lamarque) | Photo: Reuters

Published 1 October 2014
Opinion

Julia Pierson resignation is announced amid scandal of White House Security breach.

A security breach in the White House forced Julia Pierson to resign on Wednesday as the Director of Secret Service.

​The resignation came one day after Pierson attended a Congress hearing to explain the September 19 security failures, when one man managed to enter the White House.

That day, Omar J. Gonzalez jumped the White House fence, ran through the lawn and past the presidential suite, which was open. He then knocked over a Secret Service officer, managed to pass the staircases that lead to Obama’s quarters when he finally was detained by an agent at the Green Room entrance.

However, it was not until this week that it was revealed that Gonzalez managed to enter the White House. The first reports said he was arrested after jumping the fence.

Despite the Secret Service main objective of guaranteeing the safety of one of the most significant political leaders in the world, several scandals have stained this agency’s reputation in recent years .

In November 2009, the Secret Service was harshly criticised after an unknown couple crashed a state dinner and even shook hands with President Barack Obama and took a picture with Vice President Joe Biden.

Obama then asserted that such a security breach would never happen again.

Two years later, gunshots were heard at the White House. Oscar R. Ortega was arrested for shooting against the White House from the outside. However nobody realized that the bullet crashed into one of the White House windows until a housekeeper discovered the bullet holes on the window, four days later.

On April 2012, 13 Secret Service agents resigned, retired or were forced out of the agency after an embarrassing scene at a hotel in Cartagena, Colombia, when an agent got into a verbal fight with a prostitute he had slept with, two days before Obama’s arrival.

Finally, in early 2014, three Secret Service agents were suspended after getting drunk in Amsterdam, before Obama’s arrival.

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