Who said all of the drama at conventions takes place on the stage? Not to mention the entertainment, because this video taken last night certainly has that quality, for those still angry over Secret Service failures in Butler County on Saturday.

For some reason, embattled Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle showed up on the convention floor during the prime-time program. Senate Republicans Marsha Blackburn and John Barrasso confronted Cheatle and began demanding answers from her about the assassination attempt on Donald Trump, with a Blackburn aide recording the interaction. Cheatle told them that she didn't want to have that conversation on the convention floor, and then made clear she didn't want to have it at all:

A stunning scene played out at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday as a group of GOP senators chased Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle through the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, shouting that she has refused to answer questions regarding the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump.

“This was an assassination attempt! You owe the people answers. You owe president Trump answers!” Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn shouted at Cheatle, who continued to walk with her head down and ignore the senators’ criticism.

“It’s stonewalling!” Sen. John Barrasso, the No. 3 Senate Republican.

This morning, the USSS put out a statement about this confrontation that says, well ... nothing much at all:

Statement from Secret Service on Senators demanding questions from Director CHEATLE at RNC — pic.twitter.com/hOgEfnElLm

— Aishah Hasnie (@aishahhasnie) July 18, 2024

That's as helpful as Cheatle's own answers have been. Cheatle insists on one hand that the buck stops with her, and then on the other hand that she deserves to keep her job even after the abject failure that took place Saturday afternoon in Pennsylvania. The Secret Service allowed a shooter well within a perimeter to get at least three shots off at a former president, and Cheatle has offered nothing more than a series of weird excuses for it -- including a heretofore unknown Kryptonite of slightly sloped roofs.

As for it not being the time or place for the conversation, that's also on Cheatle. Blackburn adds at the end that the USSS briefing for members of the Senate and House got cut off after only a handful of questions, which explains why one of the people pursuing Cheatle in the video berates her, "You answer to us!" 

Barasso had told NBC News earlier in the day that they have learned that the Secret Service knew of a suspicious man at the event an hour before Trump took the stage, and also had warnings a couple of minutes before the shooting -- and yet did nothing to get Trump off stage before he got shot. Barrasso also scoffed at the briefing as entirely devoid of real answers and little more than a CYA effort:

Barrasso described the briefing as a "cover-your-ass" meeting and insisted that the head of the Secret Service "needs to go." No one has yet been held accountable for the security failures that led to Crooks being able to open fire, he said.

"He was identified as being suspicious one hour before the shooting," Barrasso said. "He had a range finder and a backpack. The Secret Service lost sight of him. No one has taken responsibility."

NBC also reported on that sequence:

Roughly 30 minutes after the initial suspicious person report, Pennsylvania State Police notified the Secret Service of a suspicious person at 5:51 p.m. The Secret Service notified its snipers at 5:53 p.m., the sources said.

At 6:02 p.m., Trump took the stage. At 6:09 p.m., members of the crowd notified police that Crooks, 20, was on a rooftop. Two minutes later, Crooks opened fire on Trump at 6:11 p.m.

That's two warnings to the Secret Service within less than an hour of Trump taking the stage. Why did they allow Trump to take the stage? And why, if they notified the counter-sniper teams of the danger, didn't they secure all of the high-ground locations surrounding the perimeter before proceeding with the event? The roof from which Crooks fired sat above the local-police staging area for event security, so it's not as if the location was a secret. 

And during all of this, not a single drone went up in the air to try to track the "suspicious person" that local police had reported twice in an hour.

But the buck stops with Cheatle! 

Cheatle remains unrepentatant, however. And so does the New York Times, where a report this morning paints her as a victim, or at least a sympathetic figure beset by circumstances and politics outside of her control:

‘The Buck Stops With Me’: Secret Service Director Soldiers On

Ms. Cheatle now oversees more than 8,000 agents and other personnel and a budget of more than $3 billion. That figure represents an all-time high but is still not enough, according to agency observers, to cope with staff shortages and the demands of a politically charged environment, especially in an election year.

Former agents say she has tried to make the agency, where workers deal with intensely stressful situations, more compassionate. She has taken steps to help employees repay student loans and defray the cost of child care, said Bill Glady, a former assistant director who recently retired and knew Ms. Cheatle for most of his 28 years on the job.

“She leads from the front,” he said. “She’s personal. She’s not going to give you a task that she won’t take on herself.”

Behind the scenes, Ms. Cheatle was not afraid to stand her ground, Mr. Mayorkas said. 

And ... who gives a crap? The Secret Service has a mandate to provide the highest level of security for those under its protection, especially current and former presidents. Under Cheatle's leadership, the Secret Service utterly failed in its core mission and let a 20-year-old amateur get off several shots at Trump before stopping him. Only dumb luck or the hand of Providence allowed the former president to survive -- and it still cost the life of a spectator and the health of others wounded.

Let's make the buck really stop with Cheatle, and force her out. If that means chasing her down hallways for answers she otherwise refuses to provide, so much the better. Keep the cellphone cameras handy.