Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) on Sunday called for congressional hearings on the assassination attempt on former President Trump during a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday.
Burchett said Republicans should cancel their attendance at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, this week and instead return to Washington to investigate the shooting.
“I need to go to Washington,” Burchett said in an interview with Fox News on Sunday. “I don’t care about the convention.”
“We need to find out what happened and make sure this never happens again,” he added.
Burchett said he raised the possibility with House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) during a discussion Saturday.
The Hill has reached out to Comer’s office for a response.
The request for the hearing came after a gunman opened fire at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on Saturday, wounding former President Trump in what authorities are calling an assassination attempt.
In the hours after the incident, questions were growing about how the suspect could have shot the former president, who was being protected by the Secret Service.
Comer has asked Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle to appear at a confirmation hearing later this month, but some Republican lawmakers have called for Cheatle to be fired in the wake of the shooting.
“There was a complete breakdown in communication from the bottom up,” Burchett said in an interview Sunday, speculating based on reports he’d seen elsewhere. “It starts at the top.”
“The head of the Secret Service needs to step down,” he continued. “That’s obvious, but I don’t see that happening.”
