Congress and Secret Service hold talks on candidate security

By MARY CLARE JALONICK and FARNOUSH AMIRI

WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawmakers are racing to ensure the U.S. intelligence community has enough money and resources to keep the nation's presidential candidates safe despite repeated threats of violence, but it's unclear how much they can do just weeks before the election and whether additional money would make an immediate difference.

Days after the arrest of a gunman on former President Donald Trump's golf course, the House of Representatives on Friday overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan bill, 405-0, that would require the agency to apply the same standards when assigning agents to key presidential candidates as it does to presidents and vice presidents. The agency has told Congress it has already beefed up Trump's security, but House lawmakers want to turn that into law.

The effort follows an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump at a rally in July and after Secret Service agents arrested a man with a rifle hiding on the golf course at Trump's Florida club over the weekend. The suspect in Florida also apparently tried to assassinate the Republican presidential candidate.

“In America, elections are decided at the ballot box, not by an assassin's bullet,” said Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., one of the bill's main sponsors, in the debate before the vote. “The fact that these incidents were allowed to happen is a stain on our country.”