Just a few weeks after a gunman came within an inch of assassinating former President Donald Trump, there has been another reported security lapse at a Trump rally.
This one involved a Secret Service agent abandoning her post to breast-feed.
“During a Donald Trump visit to North Carolina yesterday, a woman Secret Service special agent abandoned her post to breastfeed with no permission/warning to the event site agent,” wrote Susan Crabtree, a reporter for RealClear Politics.
In her post on X on Thursday, Ms. Crabtree cited “three sources in the Secret Service community.”
According to Ms. Crabtree, the woman in question, whom she did not name but identified as being from the Agency’s Atlanta Field Office, was nabbed by the agent in charge of the event security just five minutes before Mr. Trump’s arrival.
“The site agent went to do one final sweep of the walking route and found the agent breast-feeding her child in a room that is supposed to be set aside for important Secret Service official work, i.e. a potential emergency related to the president,” Ms. Crabtree wrote.
The Secret Service acknowledged Thursday that it is investigating the report.
“All employees of the U.S. Secret Service are held to the highest standards. While there was no impact to the North Carolina event, the specifics of this incident are being examined. Given this is a personnel matter, we are not in a position to comment further,” spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said in a statement to reporters.
The report comes less than a month after the security lapses at Mr. Trump’s Pennsylvania rally.
The agency has been under blistering criticism for, among other things, not securing a rooftop within rifle range of the main speech podium. The gunman got off eight shots, grazing Mr. Trump, killing rallygoer Corey Comperatore, and wounding two other Trump supporters.
There are now multiple congressional and executive-branch investigations under way, and agency director Kimberly Cheatle resigned in the face of bipartisan calls for her firing.
• Victor Morton can be reached at vmorton@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.