So…suppose that you are a Secret Service agent. And an obnoxious individual with a penchant for making appalling statements, coming up with incredibly destructive ideas, utter ignorance and an “I don’t care” attitude, a horrible-sounding whiny voice, a political agenda that you 100% oppose, and a general lack of any manners or politeness whatsoever has just, somehow, gotten himself elected President of the United States.
Now, unsurprisingly, this individual has become a target for numerous assassination attempts. As a Secret Service agent, it is the expectation that you will do anything within your power to protect the life of the POTUS and First Family, including taking a bullet for them if need be.
Now, it is a few weeks after Inauguration Day, and there is an actual rifle bullet flying through the air, headed for the POTUS - and here’s the hypothetical - would you actually take the bullet? Imagine that this is like a movie scene; time is temporarily frozen, you can see the rifle bullet suspended in mid-air, headed for the POTUS, and you can spend time thinking about your decision.
Assume that the following conditions apply:
If you take a bullet for this POTUS, you will either be severely maimed for life, or killed outright. That’s the hypothetical. You will either be in a coffin, or you’ll be paralyzed from the waist or neck down. You won’t be merely grazed; that bullet is going to do something devastating to you.
If you take a bullet for this POTUS, there will still be several assassination attempts on his life even after this failed one.
If you don’t step into the way to take the bullet, then the bullet will most definitely kill the POTUS.
If the POTUS dies, he will be replaced by the Vice President, who is a more decent and reasonable person than the POTUS. (Almost *anyone *is a more decent and reasonable person than the POTUS.)
It is your absolute job and honor expectation and duty that you, as a bodyguard, will take a bullet for the POTUS. Although, however, if you don’t, you will not be *exceptionally *singled out for blame. You and all the other surrounding Secret Service agents will be blamed for failure to protect the POTUS, but you will not come under special scrutiny any different than any of the other dozen agents around you. You all may be demoted or even fired, though.
There is no other way to stop the unfolding assassination attempt, other than to take the bullet. It’s too late for anything else. The bullet is already in mid-air. You can only either shield the POTUS with your body, or let the POTUS get killed. (You can’t do anything clever either, like holding up some inanimate object to block the bullet, etc. Don’t fight the hypothetical.)
No, but I wouldn’t take one for a president I liked, either. IRL, I don’t think Secret Service agents are expected to, either. They have to be willing to be in the line of fire as part of the job, but I strongly doubt there is a real expectation that they deliberately sacrifice their lives for the POTUS.
You’re job is not to protect a man, it’s to protect an institution, a leader, an office, a commander in chief. Failure to do so could cause dramatic damage to your country. If you don’t think you can, the honorable thing to do is step aside, esp for the reasons you’ve given; he’s a whiny obnoxious boor.
In any likely real life circumstance, there is no practical difference between these. “Willing to be in the line of fire” means accepting the possibility that it will be your body stopping the bullet. There is unlikely to be a situation in which the choice is any clearer and more specific.
It is standard practice for Secret Service to physically interpose and surround their charge with their own bodies when an imminent threat is perceived. We’ve already seen this happen once with Trump.
Not to fight the hypothetical too much, but if you’re a Secret Service agent you’re already prepared to take a bullet for any president you are serving. If you’re not, then you’re probably not a candidate for the Secret Service.
Yep. If I value keeping my job and upholding what I vowed to do at its inception, then I’d take a bullet for Pres. Trump. If I had a problem with him so big I couldn’t overcome it to do my then do my job, I would resign.
That is exactly what they have to promise if they choose to be on Presidential detail. Secret Service Presidential detail is only a small minority of the whole agency but it is among the elite among them or at least it is supposed to be. Despite recent scandals and mismanagement, the agents on that detail pledge to give everything they have including their lives to save the President or the President’s family.
I have a friend that grew up in a Secret Service family that did Presidential detail. He claims it was a nightmare because credible threats come in all the time. His father was working Reagan’s motorcade when he was shot by John Hinckley Jr. and he still blames his current problems on the stress that caused because he was just a schoolchild in a Virginia suburb of Washington D.C. when the shooting happened. It took a long time to figure out whether his father was one of the people shot. His father wasn’t but Reagan’s Press Secretary, James Brady who he knew quite well, took bullets for Reagan and was profoundly disabled for life until his rather recent death.
I don’t like the rather recent revelation that the Secret Service management is incompetent but every agent I have ever interacted with takes their job extremely seriously because their own life is on the line as well.
Absolutely. It’s not just about the President. The assassination of a head of state hurts the entire nation. Tempers flare, and though the populace asks for justice, what they really want is revenge.
Not to mention that an attack on the President could possibly be part of a decapitation strike preceding a military attack, up to and including a full-scale nuclear strike.
Okay, suppose you’ve already spent some time willingly working on the Presidential security detail, risking your life daily. But it’s not Trump that’s president. Suddenly, come one January day, Trump is president.
Now what do you do? If you can’t stand the idea of putting your life on the line for (ptui!) Trump, do you resign? Should you resign? Do you have the option of requesting a different detail because you think the president is, personally, a jerk? If you do that, is your Secret Service career toast?
This. We are a nation of laws, not of any individual, whether obnoxious or praiseworthy. Any President, no matter who it is, who is legitimately elected is entitled to the full protection afforded the office.
Deciding that somebody is not worthy of protection because of his obnoxious views is how we had lynchings.