GOP Rep Clashes With Acting Secret Service Director, Accuses Him Of Endangering Officials For Political Gain

WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 05: U.S. Rep. Pat Fallon (R-TX) gets into a heated exchange with U.S. Secret Service Acting Director Ronald Rowe Jr. during a hearing of the House Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump at the Rayburn House Office Building on December 05, 2024 in Washington, DC. The task force is investigating the assassination attempts on President-elect Donald J. Trump, in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13, 2024, and West Palm Beach, Florida, on September 15, 2024. (Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
U.S. Rep. Pat Fallon (R-TX) gets into a heated exchange with U.S. Secret Service Acting Director Ronald Rowe Jr. during a hearing of the House Task Force on the Attempted Assassination of Donald J. Trump (Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

OAN Staff Blake Wolf
11:17 AM – Thursday, December 5, 2024

Texas Rep. Pat Fallon engaged in a yelling match on Thursday with acting Secret Service director Ronald Rowe during a hearing regarding the U.S. Secret Services’ failures surrounding the two assassination attempts against President-elect Donald Trump.

The heated back-and-forth moment occurred after Fallon (R-Texas) first questioned Rowe’s positioning during the most recent 9/11 ceremony, showcasing a photo of President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and President-elect Donald Trump.

Fallon quickly accused Rowe of placing the Secret Service’s Special Agent in Charge (SAC) “out of position” in relation to his line of sight and shot, going against protocol, in order to get closer to Trump for a photo opportunity.

It is standard practice for the SAC to be near the president, which was not the case on this particular occasion, Fallon argued.

“Who is usually at an event like this closest to the President of the United States?” Fallon asked with the 9/11 ceremony photo behind him. “Were you the special agent in charge of the detail that day?”

“Actually congressman, what you’re not seeing is the SAC of the detail out of the picture’s view. And that is the day where we remember the more than 3,000 people that have died on 9/11. I actually responded to ground zero. I was there going through the ashes of the world trade center,” Rowe responded.

Soon after, the exchange exploded further, with both Fallon and Rowe both yelling at each other while the chairman began to demand order.

“I’m not asking that, I’m asking you, if you were … were you the special agent in charge!?” Fallon shouted, cutting Rowe off.

“I was there to show respect for a Secret Service member that died on 9/11!” Rowe thundered back. “Do not invoke 9/11 for political purposes!”

“You are out of line congressman! Way out of line!” Rowe continued.

“Don’t try to bully me!” Fallon clapped back while pointing his finger at Rowe. “I am an elected member of congress and I’m asking you a serious question and you are playing politics.”

Fallon then accused Rowe of endangering Trump and President Biden in order to be “visible” for the photo, seemingly showing off and “auditioning” for Trump to appoint him as Secret Service director in his incoming administration.

“You know why you were there!? Because you wanted to be visible because you were auditioning for this job that you’re not gonna get on January 20th! You endangered President Biden’s life, Vice President Harris’s life because you put those agents out of position!” Fallon screamed.

Meanwhile, the recorded moment erupted online and soon became viral, prompting responses from social media users.

“That’s the most openly heated exchange in the hundreds of hours I’ve watched of hearings. What the agent’s job was in 2001 is irrelevant. He’s not fit to serve in 2024. Wrong temperament,” one user stated.

“Who the hell does this asshat think he is yelling at a seated congressman? This clown has no sense of decorum and no self control and HE’s running our Secret Service? This clown needs to be thrown out on his ear. No retirement and no pension. What a horrible representation of public servants,” another added.

Nevertheless, the meeting simmered down from that point on, and the discussion regarding the objective failure of the Secret Service to specifically protect Trump during the July Butler rally campaign event continued.

“The abject failure underscored critical gaps in Secret Service operations and I recognize that we did not meet the expectations of the American public, Congress and our protected and they rightly have that idea based on how we performed,” Rowe stated.

“When I traveled there, the day after I was named the acting director, and as I’m walking around and I’m up on the roof and I’m looking at the proximity of it to the site, I was taken aback that it was not secured,” Rowe added.

Rowe became the acting director of the Secret Service after Kimberly Cheatle resigned following the disastrous incompetence of the U.S. Secret Service being on full display at Trump’s Butler rally, which saw 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, the gunman, climb up on a roof and take multiple shots at Trump, almost taking his life.

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Pennsylvania Supreme Court Backs GOP In Mail-In Ballot Dispute

Applications to vote are available on a check-in table at a polling location where voters cast their ballots during Michigan's early voting period on October 29, 2024 in Dearborn, Michigan. Early voter turnout has been heavy in Michigan, a key battleground state with 14 electoral votes, with over 250,000 early votes being cast in just the first two days. (Photo by Bill Pugliano/Getty Images)
Applications to vote are available at the check-in table at a polling location where voters cast their ballots during Michigan’s early voting period on October 29, 2024 in Dearborn, Michigan. (Photo by Bill Pugliano/Getty Images)

OAN Staff Abril Elfi
4:00 PM – Saturday, November 2, 2024

SEE: https://www.oann.com/newsroom/pennsylvania-supreme-court-backs-gop-in-mail-in-ballot-dispute/; republished below in full, unedited, for informational, educational, & research purposes:

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has blocked an attempt to allow mail-in ballots without a handwritten date from being counted in the 2024 election.

Friday's decision reverses a previous Commonwealth Court ruling that had declared the requirement for a handwritten date on ballots unconstitutional. Following an appeal by the Pennsylvania GOP, the state Supreme Court’s ruling now ensures that undated mail-in ballots will not be counted in the upcoming election.

Justice Kevin Dougherty criticized the Commonwealth Court for its decision.

“‘This Court will neither impose nor countenance substantial alterations to existing laws and procedures during the pendency of an ongoing election.’ We said those carefully chosen words only weeks ago. Yet they apparently were not heard in the Commonwealth Court, the very court where the bulk of election litigation unfolds,” Dougherty wrote.

“Today’s order, which I join, rights the ship. It sends a loud message to all courts in this Commonwealth: in declaring we would not countenance substantial alterations to existing laws and procedures during the pendency of an ongoing election, we mean what we meant and meant what we say,” he continued.

Pennsylvania Republicans praised Friday’s ruling, claiming that Democrats have repeatedly attempted to undermine the requirement for a handwritten date on ballots.

State officials supporting the counting of undated ballots argue that this change would simplify the process for election workers. 

Prior to the court’s ruling, the Pennsylvania Department of State submitted a brief advocating for the change.

“The requirement that county boards set aside mail ballots with declaration-date errors — and particularly the requirement that they set aside mail ballot envelopes with ‘incorrect’ dates — imposed a significant burden on county boards. Election workers must manually review each ballot envelope to determine whether it has a ‘correct’ date,” the brief said, according to the Pennsylvania Capital-Star.

Friday’s decision marks the second time this month that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has halted Democrat-supported attempts to remove the dating requirement.

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Mad Maxine Waters Calls Trump Backers ‘Domestic Terrorists’ Prepping for ‘Civil War’

SEE: https://www.ammoland.com/2024/06/mad-maxine-waters-calls-trump-backers-domestic-terrorists-prepping-for-civil-war/; republished below in full, unedited, for informational, educational, & research purposes:
USA Flag Cracked Concrete Constitution Crisis Goverment iStock-Paul Campbell 977454982
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) is worried about a civil war and claims Donald Trump supporters are “domestic terrorists.” iStock-Paul Campbell 977454982

U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) asserted during an appearance on MSNBC that supporters of former President Donald Trump are “domestic terrorists” who may be “preparing a civil war against us.”

Fox News and other news agencies have picked up on the 85-year-old congresswoman’s comments. She also reportedly declared, “It is not just that [Trump is] a criminal, this is a man who disrespects the Constitution and democracy and we have got to find out what they are doing as domestic terrorists [who] tried to take over the government on Jan. 6.”

Waters, a career anti-gunner, accused Trump of not caring about democracy or the U.S. Constitution. She claimed Trump is “in love with Putin and Russia and Kim Jong-un and North Korea.”

Perhaps the most ominous of her remarks, as quoted by Fox, were revelations that she will ask the Justice Department and President Joe Biden “to tell us what they are going to do to protect this country against violence if [Biden] loses.”

“I want to know about all of those right-wing organizations that [Trump] is connected with who are training up in the hills somewhere and targeting what communities they are going to attack,” Waters stated. “We need to know now, given that he is telling us there is going to be violence if he loses. We need to know what his plan is and how we are going to be protected.”

According to AOL.com, the California congresswoman is distressed that Trump has claimed his trial was “rigged.”

At that point, Trump appears to have a lot of company. A CBS News/You.Gov poll found that 86 percent of Republicans and 46 percent of Independents believe the former president did not get a fair trial. Meanwhile, 96 percent of Democrats and 54 percent of Independents thought the trial was fair, while only 14 percent of Republicans agreed.

“Most Democrats say it’s made them more confident in the justice system,” CBS reported. “Among Republicans, three quarters say it’s made them less confident in it.”

It was Waters who, back in 2018, encouraged her supporters to “publicly confront and harass members of the Trump administration in response to the ‘zero tolerance’ policy that led to the separation of families at the border,” according to CNN at the time.

 

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What about Waters’ allegations about Trump supporters “training in the hills somewhere?” Where is the evidence?

According to raw data from the FBI's National Instant Check System, May's background check inquiries topped 2.1 million. There have been more than 2 million checks initiated monthly for more than a year, and though roughly only half may be directly linked to a firearms transaction, it amounts to millions of firearms purchases.

Waters and other Democrats do not want to see gun sales continuing at a steady pace. But a lot of Americans, for whatever reason, are buying guns. Violent crime, police manpower shortages, and even rhetoric about potential violence pending the outcome of the November election from Waters and others may contribute to a sense of uncertainty.

It is nothing new for Trump critics to accuse his supporters of being misfits in one form or another. Hillary Clinton branded Trump supporters as “deplorables,” a brand the Trump crowd accepted with pride. The very reference to “MAGA Republicans” often mouthed by President Joe Biden and others is something akin to social prejudice.

Trump’s conviction gives Biden and every other Democrat down the ladder the chance to call him a convicted felon. Mediaite notes that Biden is already doing it. It will definitely become part of every campaign from Congress to state legislatures. Out in Washington State, for example, the far left, anti-gun Democrat Attorney General Bob Ferguson—now running for the governor’s office—is doing it, posting on “X” (formerly Twitter), “Dave Reichert’s candidate for president just got convicted of 34 felonies. I’m running for Governor to uphold the law. America must not elect a convicted felon for president.”

Republican Reichert is a former King County sheriff and congressman who has arrested criminals, and his candidacy for governor obviously has Ferguson and Democrats worried, even though Ferguson appears to have lots more money in his campaign coffers than Reichert.

Back to Waters, the Washington Examiner also quoted the congresswoman, who stated, “I’m worried that he’s so divisive, and that he’s talking about retribution, and they’re talking about revenge, and I think that that’s dangerous.”

Considering Waters’ previous advice to her followers to “confront and harass” members of Trump’s administration, she appears to be an expert on divisiveness.


About Dave WorkmanDave Workman

Maxine Waters Calls Trump Supporters ‘Domestic Terrorists,’ Demands Action Against Them

AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite
Trump was convicted in a trial that was so fair, so evenhanded that it would have warmed the cold, cold heart of Uncle Joe Stalin. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Hate Orange Man), however, is still not satisfied. Now, she wants the “Justice” Department to go after the supporters of the man the left loves to hate, and who knows? That could very well be the plan.Waters announced on MSNBC: “I am going to spend some time with the criminal justice system, with the justice system, asking them, ‘Tell us what’s going on with the domestic terrorists." Are they preparing for a civil war against us? Should we be concerned about our safety? What is he doing with this divisive language? It's dangerous, and we’re going to have to make sure that we understand, uh, that we’re not at risk with this man talkin’ in the way that he’s doing.'”

It's fitting: if anyone knows how dangerous talkin’ can be, it’s Mad Maxine. She has a long history of doing it herself.

Back in Oct. 2017, when her bête noire was in the White House, Waters spoke at the Ali Forney dinner for LGBT youth in New York and was in high spirits. “Wow, what a moving evening this is,” Waters told the crowd. “I’m sitting here listening, watching, absorbing, thinking about Ali even though I never met him. And with this kind of inspiration, I will go and take out Trump tonight.”

A firestorm ensued, but Waters waved it away, insisting that she was simply talking about impeaching Trump and removing him from office: “Everybody knows that I’m on the front lines not talking about harming anybody but I am talking about impeachment." I don’t think this President should be representing our country … he creates controversy, he cannot get along with our members of Congress, and I’m going to continue my efforts to impeach him.” How she thought she could singlehandedly impeach Trump on the night of the Ali Forney dinner, she didn’t bother to explain.

Waters showed a taste for incendiary rhetoric on other occasions as well. In 2018, she called on her followers to confront and menace Trump administration officials. “If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant,” Waters told a gaggle of her followers, “in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them, and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere.”

Then in April 2021, as the nation and the world held its breath waiting for the verdict in the trial of Derek Chauvin, the police officer accused of murdering George Floyd, Waters threw gasoline on the flames: “I hope we get a verdict that says guilty, guilty, guilty. And if we don’t, we cannot go away. We’ve got to stay on the street. We get more active, we’ve got to be more confrontational. We’ve got to make sure that they know that we mean business.” That was too much even for the leftist propagandists at CNN, who ran a piece entitled “Maxine Waters just inflamed a very volatile situation.”

But now she professes to be worried that Trump’s comments about his trial and conviction being politically motivated and dangerous for America’s future as a free republic will move those MAGA-hatted racist redneck yahoos (whom we hear about so much from leftists but never see in real life) to commit acts of violence. Coming from someone who has always waved away concerns about her own potential incitement, this is oddly inconsistent — at least until one remembers that for leftists, the rules they apply to their ideological foes never, ever apply to themselves.

     Related: In Michigan, Leftists Have Started Knocking on Doors in the Middle of the Night

After all, the object of Waters's unquenchable hatred, Donald Trump, has never called for violence, yet Waters and other leftists insist that he is a dangerous insurrectionist who is bent on destroying “our democracy” and ruling as a dictator. The real worry, however, is or should be over Waters herself and her comrades. They don’t hesitate to use the language of incitement against those whom they hate and fear and are so intent on demonizing and dehumanizing their opponents that they are creating an environment in which violence against Trump supporters will be widely seen as justified and even necessary.

If she weren’t so dangerous, Maxine Waters would merely be ridiculous. Other authoritarians who were inclined to violence, including that little German fellow with the Charlie Chaplin mustache, have been faintly ridiculous, too.

Robert Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He is author of 28 books, including many bestsellers such as The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades), The Truth About Muhammad, The History of Jihad, and The Critical Qur’an. His latest book is Muhammad: A Critical Biography. Spencer has led seminars on Islam and jihad for the FBI, the United States Central Command, United States Army Command and General Staff College, the U.S. Army’s Asymmetric Warfare Group, the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF), the Justice Department’s Anti-Terrorism Advisory Council and the U.S. intelligence community. He is a senior fellow with the Center for Security Policy. Follow him on Twitter here. Like him on Facebook here. For media inquiries, contact communications@pjmedia.com.

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Report: Speaker Johnson Vows Revenge Against GOP House Members with Rep Andy Biggs

Speaker Johnson vowed to retaliate against House Republicans who don't go along with his Democratic coalition agenda, but will he get ousted? And Chris Cuomo flips on the shots and admits anti-vaxxers were right. Plus we'll find out how American small business owners feel about Biden's America, spoiler alert, it's not good. And the establishment push to leverage AI to improve its economic and social progress continues.

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