Bill Donohue

Vice President aspirant and Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said this week that not only does abortion liberate women, “men are also more free in a country where we have a president who stands up for things like access to abortion care. Men are more free.”

Buttigieg, who contends that he is married to a man, is right about that. Abortion does in fact make men free. They are free from their fatherly duties, thus allowing them to prey on women—in the name of liberating them—while appearing to be on their side. It’s a dream come true.

In an article by Judith Blake in Science, published in 1971, two years before abortion was legalized in Roe v. Wade, she found that college-educated men were the strongest supporters of legal abortion. Indeed, little has changed since then.

When I taught a course on Family Relations at La Roche College in Pittsburgh, I asked my students, most of whom were nursing students, to explain why single men have always been the greatest champions of a woman’s “right to choose”? Is it because they have long been closet feminists? Or is there something else going on? The women knew exactly what was going on. Reckless men love abortion.

In a 2022 article published by Business Insider, it found that the majority of young men (and young women) were supportive of abortion rights but that older men (those over 50) were the least supportive. This makes sense. Reckless older men have less of a vested interest in abortion, but reckless younger men see it as freeing them from their responsibilities. It allows them to tell their pregnant girlfriend to find an abortion clinic and liberate themselves of their baby; ever obliging, she can even charge it to his credit card. It’s a win-win. For him.

Survey after survey shows that public support for abortion declines markedly the later into pregnancy a woman is; there is very little support for late-term abortions and partial-birth abortions. Buttigieg disagrees. His enthusiasm for abortion rights knows no limits.

On “The View,” Meghan McCain asked Buttigieg in 2020 “exactly [what] your line is” about when to draw the line on abortion. He said “it shouldn’t be up to a government official to draw the line. It should be up to the woman who’s confronted.”

McCain pressed him, asking if he was okay with infanticide. His answer was disingenuous. “Does anybody seriously think that’s what these cases are about?” She responded, “I think that people care about that, yes.”

Similarly, the year before, Chris Wallace on “Fox News,” said to Buttigieg, “So just to be clear. You’re saying that you would be okay with a woman well into her third trimester deciding to abort her pregnancy?” To which he said, “Look, these hypotethicals are usually set up in order to provoke a strong emotional….” Wallace retorted, “It’s not hypothetical. There are 6,000 women a year who get abortions in the third trimester.” He answered, “That’s right, representing less than one percent of cases.”

In other words, Buttigieg disagrees with almost everyone. He is in the tiny minority who believe abortion should be legal in virtually every instance, regardless of how late into pregnancy it is. He can’t even condemn infanticide. This explains why he is opposed to legislation that makes it illegal to provide medical care to an infant who survives an abortion. It doesn’t get more radical than this.

Notice, too, that when Wallace said that 6,000 women a year get an abortion in the third trimester that Buttigieg erased their humanity by citing a statistic. That’s the way extremists think: they don’t see the faces of women or their unborn babies—they dissolve them to a stat.

Buttigieg does not want to make abortion “safe, legal and rare.” His idea of male and female liberation is to make it as frequent as can be. He is way out there.

Contact Buttigieg’s chief of staff, Mohsin Syed: mohsin.syed@dot.gov

Bill Donohue

Thomas Jolly, the Artistic Director of the Olympic ceremonies, insulted Christians all over the world by offering an obscene portrayal of the Last Supper during the opening ceremonies. He is scheduled to do the closing ceremony. He should not be allowed to do so.

Yesterday, I wrote to Thomas Bach, President of the International Olympic Committee, asking him to launch an investigation of French government officials who may have been complicit in this vile attack on Christian sensibilities. There is good reason to believe that they were. Today we are asking him and others to do what they can to stop Jolly from doing the closing ceremony.

We are also contacting the fifteen major sponsors of the Olympics; leading American political figures; and the U.S. Olympic Committee. We are asking that they convey to Bach their request that someone other than Jolly be permitted to conduct the closing ceremony. Surely there are competent artists who can be asked to do this, men and women whose idea of artistic expression does not include hate speech.

Please contact as many of these people and organizations that you can. Click here for the names and email addresses.

This letter was sent today to the president of the International Olympic Committee. We will announce our next step addressing this issue tomorrow. Please email your concerns to: media@paris2024.org

                                                                                         July 29, 2024

Mr. Thomas Bach
President
International Olympic Committee
Maison Olympique
1007 Lausanne
Switzerland

Dear Mr. Bach:

As president of the largest Catholic civil rights organization in the United States, I am imploring you to conduct an investigation into the obscene antics that marked the opening ceremony at the Paris Olympics. There is reason to believe senior members of the French government knew what Thomas Jolly was planning to do and did nothing to stop it. They may even have given their blessings to this stunt.

French president Emmanuel Macron was not kept in the dark. He learned that Jolly was planning a “great story of emancipation and freedom.” More important, it was reported by the New York Times that Macron had “a keen interest in the show” and met with Jolly “regularly.” It is hard to believe they didn’t discuss the show’s content.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo also had strong interest in the show; she, too, met with Jolly regularly. According to the Times, she said his production would be “playful, with a message of the city’s ‘openness to the world and the pleasure of diversity.’” It is hardly a big leap to conclude that Jolly disclosed to her his “playful” skit, one that would celebrate the “pleasure of diversity.”

Tony Estanguet, the President of Paris 2024, appointed Jolly to be Artistic Director of the Olympic ceremonies. In his statement in 2022 heralding his choice, he bragged how Jolly’s “extraordinary shows are proof that he knows how to break norms and take them to the next level.”

How revealing. Are we to believe that what Estanguet had in mind was a mockery of Islam?

The Associated Press reported the week before the opening ceremony that Jolly remained “extremely tight-lipped about what would eventually transpire at the ceremony.” He admitted, “I’d be fired if I tell you anything.” Perhaps. Had he disclosed what his show was about, he may have gotten fired because of the worldwide pushback from Christians. He certainly would not have lost favor with the French elite. Not one of the three that I mentioned has condemned Jolly’s bigotry.

You are in a position to get to the bottom of this. Jolly did not pull this off by himself. Those in positions of power need to be questioned about what they knew, when they knew it, and why they didn’t act to stop this vulgar assault on Christian sensibilities.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

William A. Donohue, Ph.D.

President

Bill Donohue

The vulgar parody of the Last Supper at the opening ceremony of the 2024 Olympics in Paris was not simply the product of one very sick anti-Christian bigot. There is good reason to believe that senior French officials gave their blessings to this attack on Christianity. That is why we are asking the International Olympic Committee to launch an investigation.

Much of the attention so far has been on the antics of the man who created the offensive skit, Thomas Jolly. According to the New York Times, growing up his parents “nurtured his passions for dolls and classical dance.” They did a good job—he is a homosexual. Whether his parents nurtured his animus against Christianity, or whether it is an expression of his guilt, is unknown, but his Olympic stunt was not the solo exercise the media would have us believe.

Days before the opening ceremony, the Associated Press reported that Jolly was being “extremely tight-lipped about what would eventually transpire at the ceremony.” But everyone knew he was up to something. “‘I’ll be fired if I tell you anything,’ Jolly says with a ‘cheeky laugh.’” Now why in the world would Jolly say that? Was he planning to mock Muslims? Not on his life.

A French politician, Marion Maréchal, condemned what Jolly did, saying that he does not speak for France but was the product of a “left-wing minority.” Not so fast. There is reason to believe France’s leaders were complicit.

President Emmanuel Macron was not kept in the dark. He learned that Jolly was planning a “great story of emancipation and freedom.” More important, it was reported by the New York Times that Macron had “a keen interest in the show” and met with Jolly “regularly.” It is hard to believe they didn’t discuss the show’s content.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo also had strong interest in the show; she, too, met with Jolly regularly. According to the Times, she said his production would be “playful, with a message of the city’s ‘openness to the world and the pleasure of diversity.’” Now why in the world would she say that? What kind of “playful” skit would someone like Jolly craft that would celebrate the “pleasure of diversity”?

Tony Estanguet is President of Paris 2024; he is currently being investigated for financial improprieties. He is the one who appointed Jolly to be Artistic Director of the Olympic ceremonies. In his statement in 2022 heralding his choice, he bragged how Jolly’s “extraordinary shows are proof that he knows how to break norms and take them to the next level.” Now why in the world would he say that? Does he think Jolly was going to break Islamic norms?

The apologies that have been offered for this obscene act are totally insincere. Indeed, they are liars.

Paris 2024 spokesperson, Anne Descamps, said, “Clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group.” It’s true they never intended to disrespect the Amish. The opening ceremony, she said, “tried to celebrate community tolerance.” Another lie.

Jolly knew exactly what he was doing—his overriding goal was to trash Christianity. Mission accomplished. Now he wants us to believe that “My wish isn’t to be subversive, not to mock or to shock. Most of all, I wanted to send a message of love, a message of inclusion and not at all to divide.” No real man speaks this way. Why not have the guts to tell the truth?

I am writing to International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach about this incident. He needs to investigate the extent to which French officials were complicit in this assault on Christian sensibilities.

Last November, Bach welcomed the adoption by the 78^th Session of the United Nations General Assembly of a resolution about the observance of the Olympic Games. In his address to the General Assembly, he said that sport “can only unite the entire world in peaceful competition if we are not torn apart by political, religious, cultural or other interests and differences. Therefore, we must be politically neutral and stand against any kind of discrimination.”

It is beyond debate that Jolly’s opening stunt mocking the Last Supper was done to tear apart the religious and cultural interests of Christians, thus violating the precepts Bach outlined. Those who are responsible for this travesty need to be exposed and dealt with accordingly.

Contact: media@paris2024.org

Bill Donohue

Is diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) a good thing or a bad thing? We have been told by its supporters that it is a good thing, but now that it is being used against Kamala Harris, it is now a bad thing.

MSNBC commentator Joy Reid says, “DEI is actually a good thing,” but hastens to add that it is racist to say that Harris is a DEI hire. Wouldn’t that suggest that DEI is itself racist? By contrast, no one would say that merit is a good thing, but it is racist to say that those hired on this basis are racists.

University of Tennessee law professor Glenn H. Reynolds notes that “Diversity is code for specified hiring and promotion quotas based on race, gender, sexuality and similar factors. In practice, it boils down to discrimination.” Everyone knows this is true, yet there is pushback against those who say Harris is a DEI hire. There shouldn’t be.

When he was running for president four years ago, Joe Biden said in March 2020 that he was going to pick a woman for his vice president if he were to win the nomination. That’s a quota—it automatically eliminates roughly half the adult population from consideration because of their sex. In July, when he was the presumptive nominee, he said he was considering four black women to be his running mate. Now 94 percent of the population was eliminated from consideration.

In other words, Harris was chosen because she is a black woman. So why are DEI fans upset when this is pointed out? Susan Rice, the former UN ambassador, said it was “incredibly insulting” to say Harris is a “DEI hire.” Similarly, Maxwell Frost, a Democratic congressman, said, “Whenever you hear DEI, I want you to think about the N-word.”

Do these people really think Harris was chosen because she was the best candidate? New York State Attorney General Letitia James seems to think so. She called her “an overachiever.” She did not say what she has achieved. We do know that she came from a privileged background yet failed her first bar exam. That put her in a special category: more than 72 percent of those who took it passed.

It didn’t matter in the end. Even though she flunked the test, she was hired as a deputy district attorney in Alameda County. How many white people are hired for such a job after they fail the bar?

Before the Supreme Court struck down quotas, DEI was called affirmative action. Michelle Obama knows all about this. She was 32nd in her high school class. It didn’t matter in the end. She was admitted to Princeton University. One of her classmates finished 7th but she was rejected by all of the Ivy League schools she applied to. She was white.

If a baseball player who broke a major league record were to defend taking performance-enhancing drugs, but took umbrage at those who mocked his achievement, we would laugh him off the stage. Ditto for the conflicted champions of DEI. It’s too late to spin it.

Bill Donohue

In assessing her candidacy for president of the United States, it is instructive to consider the positions taken by Vice President Kamala Harris on several issues of interest to Catholics.

She is a passionate defender of abortion rights. Indeed, there is no record of her opposing abortion at any time during gestation or for any reason whatsoever. She has also tried to force states that restrict abortions to obtain federal approval from the Department of Justice before implementing them.

When Harris was California’s attorney general, she bludgeoned pro-life activist David Daleiden. He used undercover videos to expose how abortion operatives harvest and sell aborted fetal organs. She authorized her office to raid his home: they seized his camera equipment and copies of revealing videos that implicated many of those who work in the abortion industry.

In her role as California AG she also sought to cripple crisis pregnancy centers with draconian regulations. Specifically, she supported a bill that would force these centers to inform clients where they could obtain an abortion. She was sued and lost in the Supreme Court three years later.

Like many other Democrats, Harris is not content to sanction child abuse in the womb. Even when they are born, she is okay with letting those who survive an abortion die.

To be specific, on February 25, 2020, Sen. Harris voted against the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, a bill that would “prohibit a health care practitioner from failing to exercise the proper degree of care in the case of a child who survives an abortion or attempted abortion.” That’s called infanticide.

Harris’ record on abortion and infanticide is at odds with her opposition to the death penalty. When it comes to convicted serial rapists and mass shooters, she wants to spare their lives. In 2019, she was explicitly asked if she opposed the death penalty for acts of treason. She said she did.

There we have it. Harris says that those who endanger the safety of all Americans by attempting a violent overthrow of the government, or spying on the military for a foreign enemy, should have their lives spared, but innocent children who are moments away from being born are not entitled to have their lives spared. And children who survive an abortion, but are in need of medical attention, can be left to die on the table, and no one will be held accountable.

The Democratic Party is the proud party of homosexual activists and transgender radicals.

Harris is so happy to see two people of the same sex “marry” that she actually performed “marriages“ between gay couples in 2004. She also opposed Proposition 8, the California initiative barring gay marriage. The people spoke—they voted for it—but she does not believe in “power to the people”: she believes in power to the ruling class (which won in the Supreme Court).

When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis supported a bill that would prohibit teachers in the early grades, K-3rd grade, from being indoctrinated with gay and transgender propaganda, she opposed it. In doing so she also showed her contempt for parental rights; the bill prohibited efforts to undermine them.

Harris’ enthusiasm for transgender rights includes allowing females who claim to be men to join the military and males who claim to be female to compete against girls and women in sports.

Religious liberty is a First Amendment right, but her deeds suggest she is not supportive of it. As a U.S. senator, she co-sponsored the “Do No Harm Act” that would force religious institutions to violate their doctrinal prerogatives.

Harris even co-sponsored the most anti-religious liberty bill ever introduced, the Equality Act. It would coerce Catholic doctors and hospitals to perform abortions and to mutilate the genitals of young people seeking to transition to the opposite sex. This bill would sideline the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, a 1993 bill that ensures that the government does not encroach on religious rights.

In 2018, the Catholic League was among the first organizations in the nation to protest her attack on a Catholic nominee for a federal district judge post. She badgered Brian Buescher at a hearing, simply because he was a member of the Knights of Columbus, a male entity.

As I pointed out at the time, Harris has never objected to Jewish women groups or the League of Women Voters. Just a Catholic male group. What really got her goat is Buescher’s membership in a Catholic organization that is pro-life and pro-marriage, rightly understood. In other words, she was invoking a religious test for public office, which is unconstitutional.

The one incident where Harris proved to be religion-friendly was a stunt she pulled that violated separation of church and state. In 2021, she created a video to be played in Virginia black churches urging everyone to vote for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe. The video aired in 300 churches for several weeks. Harris starred in it, beckoning congregants to vote for him.

Harris’ record on life, marriage, gender ideology and religion are deeply troubling. There are no signs that she is about to change.

Bill Donohue

It didn’t take long. J.D. Vance, Donald Trump’s pick to be his vice president, is a convert to Catholicism, and already that is a source of anger among the haters. He is being dubbed an “integralist” and a “Christian nationalist.” Our interest has less to do with Vance than it does the nature of attacks on Catholics of a traditional stripe.

Anthea Butler teaches at the University of Pennsylvania and is a regular guest on MSNBC. The religion professor contends that God is “a white racist.” She claims Vance is “aligned with what is called Catholic integralism, the belief that Christians can use a ‘soft power’ approach to exert influence over society.” She cites his opposition to killing babies in the womb as one such example of what she means.

Jack Jenkins is the national reporter for the Religion News Service. He also believes Vance is guilty of Catholic “integralism.” He is unhappy with Vance for not answering questions about “his own thoughts regarding Catholic integralism.”

What is Catholic integralism? That was the title of an article by Steven P. Millies in 2019. It’s an old idea, he says, one that seeks “the integration of religious authority and political power.”

So who are these “integralists” who want a theocracy? To prove his point he says “Pope Francis remains a head of state today.” He is also upset with Catholic writer Sohrab Ahmari for saying we need to “fight the culture war with the aim of defeating the enemy.” That makes him an “integralist.”

Kevin Augustyn authored an article on this subject for Discourse magazine that is even better. “This ideology is growing, vibrant and influential, but it is inherently illiberal and dangerous to American democracy.” He says the believers maintain that it is wrong to separate church and state. So who are they? He does not say. He quotes none of them.

He also claims that “some integralists” are committed to a “totalitarian vision that justifies such things as the disenfranchisement of women, Jews, atheists and indeed all non-Catholics; the persecution of heretics and sexual minorities; the kidnapping of secretly baptized children; and the abolition of religious toleration even for other Christians.”

These “integralists” sound like maniacs. So who are they? He does not say. He quotes none of them.

Justin Dyer is executive director of the Civitas Institute and a professor of government at the University of Texas at Austin. He wrote a piece for the Washington Post last year on “the logic of integralism” that is precious.

He says Catholic integralists believe in lots of weird things. “Nothing is truly private” and “there is no private life or private conscience.” So who are they? He does not say. He quotes none of them.

These writers would have us believe that this is the way Vance thinks. But no one seems to be able to come up with anything he has said that sustains this charge. In fact, what Vance has said is true and admirable.

“My views on public policy and what the optimal state should look like are pretty aligned with Catholic social teaching. That was one of the things that drew me to the Catholic Church. I saw a real overlap between what I would like to see and what the Catholic Church would like to see.”

If that makes him an “integralist,” we need more of them. I hasten to add that some of the books I have authored were specifically written to give sustenance to what Vance believes. Guess that makes me an “integralist” as well, though I didn’t know it until now.

Christian nationalism is the big bogeyman for Christian bashers. So we knew someone would charge Vance as being a devotee. The first to do so is a U.S. Senator, Chris Murphy from Connecticut. He says Vance was picked “to help shape this transition away from democratic norms, this transition to a white, patriarchal, Christian-dominated nation.”

So what did Vance say to merit this accusation? He does not say. He quotes nothing he ever said.

So who is Sen. Murphy? He grew up in a congregational church and now admits he rarely goes to church. He blames his children and his schedule.  He says he is “not a regular churchgoer these days, in part because of kids. In part because of a busy schedule.”

His “busy schedule” has earned him an “F” lifetime rating on life issues from Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America. His lust for abortion extends to infanticide: he has consistently voted against efforts to protect children who are born alive after failed abortions. Planned Parenthood consistently gives him a rating of 100%. He also earned a 100% rating from the Human Rights Campaign, the big anti-science and anti-women LGBT group.

As I said at the beginning, these attacks are not merely aimed at Vance—they are aimed at all traditional Catholics. These haters want to demonize us and drive us out of the public square. But they are in over their heads—our side is growing and getting bolder. We will make sure of that.

Bill Donohue

The media are so fixated on finding a political motive that explains why  Thomas Matthew Crooks tried to assassinate Donald Trump that they are overlooking other factors. There are psychological and cultural variables that are vastly more important.

Crooks was a registered Republican who made a small donation to a left-wing group when Biden was inaugurated. As an explanatory variable, that’s a dead end.

A much more fruitful approach would be to consider the psychological profile of Crooks: it matches to a tee the characteristics of other mass shooters. Also worthy of probing is the culture that gives rise to these shootings. I have written extensively about this issue and have taught sociology courses on it. Here is my analysis.

Crooks was a loner. He was quiet and had few friends; he was known to just stare at his classmates when they sought to engage him. A student who went to the same high school as Crooks, Kendall Spragg, noted that he would sometimes eat lunch by himself. “He really didn’t fit in with everybody else,” he said. These attributes are commonplace among mass shooters.

• In 2023, Audrey Hale, a girl who mistakenly thought she was a boy, killed six people at Covenant School. Averianna Patton, who knew her, said she was “very quiet, very shy.” Another person who knew her, Mia Phillips, observed that “We felt she was shy.” Maria Colomy, her teacher, commented that “She was very quiet.”
• In 2022, Salvador Ramos shot and killed young students and their teachers in Uvalde, Texas. His boss at Wendy’s noted that “He felt like the quiet type, the one who doesn’t say much. He really didn’t socialize with employees.”
• In 2022, Payton Gendron became known as the “Buffalo Mass Shooter.” According to the Associated Press, “he had long been viewed by classmates as a loner.” One of his peers said, “Most people didn’t associate with him,” characterizing him as “socially awkward and nerdy.” The same person remarked that “He would say he was lonely.”
• In 2021, Robert Aaron Long went on a rampage in Atlanta. One of his classmates, Nico Straughan, noticed the mass shooter was a “very quiet” individual. Another classmate, Jonathan Desire, said he was “quiet, calm, and collected.” Another fellow student concurred, saying, “he didn’t have a ton of friends and really kept to himself.”
• In 2021, the mass shooter from Boulder, Colorado, Ahmed Al Aliwi Alissa, had no friends. His brother labeled him “very anti-social.” A high school classmate said he “didn’t really have a lot of friends.”
• In 2019, the mass shooter from El Paso, Texas, Patrick Wood Crusius, typically sat alone in the school bus. “He wouldn’t talk to people,” said one of his neighbors. “No one really knew him.”
• In 2019, Connor Betts, a mass shooter from Dayton, Ohio, was labeled by one of his classmates at a “loner.” Another said he was a “quiet” kid who kept to himself.
• In 2018, Stephen Paddock shot and killed 60 people when he went on a shooting spree in Las Vegas. He was a loner who could never establish a long-term relationship with anyone, including his family.
• In 2018, Dimitrios Pagourtzis shot and killed 10 people at Sante Fe High School in Texas. He was known as a “weird loner.” One of his classmates said, “He stuck to himself. He had a few friends but never really talked to many people.”

Being a loner does not cause someone to be a mass shooter, but when it is coupled with other factors, it manifests itself as a leading red flag indicator.

Loners crave the same type of bonds that all of us do. When they are unable to achieve them, it creates psychological havoc. Unfortunately, we are mass producing the kind of social soil that makes it harder to bond with others. Dysfunctional families, mixed messages on what is morally right and wrong, long hours spent on social media, obsessing over video games, the lack of religious affiliations—all of these factors make it harder to form lasting social bonds.

All of us want affection and recognition. When it is denied, it can lead to behaviors that are toxic. Though it is hard to comprehend, many mass shooters find recognition—it’s more like a rush—in doing something spectacular, making it is impossible for everyone to ignore them.

Busting down the walls of ennui—the horror of boredom—is important to those who live an asocial life. Parents, teachers, counselors, coaches and the clergy need to know what the red flags of a mass shooter are and intervene to ameliorate conditions before it is too late.

We were not made to be alone. That is not part of God’s design. A mature society would concede as much and tailor its policies, programs and strictures accordingly. We should be fostering social bonds, not obliterating them.

Bill Donohue

The Catholic League is running radio ads during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee; they started July 14 and will run through July 19 (we will do likewise next month when the Democrats meet in Chicago).

The ads are running on WLS 890 AM. It is based in Chicago and has one of the largest radio signals in the world; it is also one of the top news talk stations in Milwaukee (which is only 90 miles from Chicago).

In addition, we are periodically sponsoring WLS’s coverage of the events. For example, at the top of the hour, the radio station will announce that it is covering the convention, acknowledging the Catholic League as a sponsor. We hope to draw new members as a result.

Here is the text of the ad that is being run on WLS 890 AM.

The Catholic League extends a warm welcome to Republicans convening in Milwaukee.

While there are many critical issues facing our country, the Catholic League believes the number-one civil rights issue of our day is the exploitation of children done in the name of gender ideology.

Pope Francis has labeled gender ideology as the “ugliest danger” of our time.

The Catholic League believes it is outrageous that children are being coaxed into thinking that they can change their sex. Attempts to do so have serious mental and physical consequences. Moreover, allowing men to compete in women’s sports is subversive of women’s rights.

Please address this issue.

Bill Donohue

What happened in Butler, Pennsylvania is emblematic of our culture of comfortableness. We are a nation that lacks accountability for misconduct and incompetence, the net result of which is a growing pattern of serious social problems. It is institutionally ubiquitous.

From “soft on crime” initiatives to nearly non-existent student disciplinary measures—to weak performance standards in the workplace and on the ball field—offenders and slackers have been treated with impunity. It is this culture that accounts for the failure of the Secret Service to protect former president Donald Trump. Here are a few examples.

• In March 2017, a 26-year-old man, Jonathan Tuan-Anh Tran, jumped the fence at the White House while carrying a dangerous weapon; he had two cans of Mace. Astonishingly, he was allowed to walk around for 15 minutes before he was apprehended by two Secret Service agents. While they were fired, a week later Tran was released. The following year he was found carrying a knife while attempting to illegally enter the office of Rep. Devin Nunes.
• In 2022, Arian Taherzadeh, 40, and Haider Ali, 35, duped four Secret Service officials by posing as officers and employees of the federal government. They obtained paraphernalia, handguns and assault rifles used by federal law enforcement agencies. These were not ordinary members of the Secret Service: one was on detail for the first lady; another was a uniformed division officer in the White House; a third was on detail for Vice President Kamala Harris; and the fourth was assigned to the presidential protection detail. None was fired—they were merely suspended.
• In April 2024, a female Secret Service special agent assigned to cover the vice president jumped on her boss and began beating him. The agent, Michelle Herczeg, who had a history of aberrant behavior, chest-bumped and shoved her superior, then tackled him and punched him while still having her gun in her holster. Fellow agents wrestled her gun away, cuffed her and removed her from the premises. When questioned about this, Anthony Guglielmi, chief communications officer for the Secret Service, called the incident a “medical matter.” The offending agent was not fired—she was simply removed from Harris’ detail.

These are just a few examples that we know of in recent times.

Regarding the last incident, Rep. James Comer, who chairs the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, argues that the Secret Service, under the tutelage of its director, Kimberly Cheatle, has become so concerned about the diversity, equity and inclusion agenda that it has lost sight of its primary mission, namely providing the highest standards of security. How much of this accounts for the relaxation of standards is debatable, but that it plays any role whatsoever is outrageous.

If there is no accountability, and if a culture of comfortableness is tolerated, we can expect more incidents of wrongdoing and incompetence. Lowering standards is a prescription for failure.

That a young man armed with a rifle can get to the rooftop of a building close enough to kill the former president—and a current presidential candidate—without being noticed by the Secret Service is mindboggling. Unless the corrupt culture that nourishes this condition is addressed, there will be more such instances. And the next time may be too late.