Zero Fail is one of two Secret Service books I have read recently. It is a history of the agency by a talented investigative journalist, which traces the Secret Service and its leadership from its origins in the Treasury Department, through its changing roles and capabilities as the protectors of Presidents, and its transition in the early 2000s to being one federal police agency among many in the post-9/11 Homeland Security Department.
Leonnig is particularly interested in the major failures that shaped the agency from its inception, particularly presidential assassinations and attempts, and how the need to protect the agency in the wake of those failures helped create a closed, defensive organizational culture, which has continued to tolerate and cover up mistakes, as well as the bad behavior, institutional sexism, drunken excesses and sexual antics of agents and supervisors.
A penetrating analysis and treasure trove of “inside secrets” from the agency which continues to have “zero fail” (in protecting the president) as the standard to which it should and must be held.
This account concludes in near-present time, and does include coverage of Donald Trump's attempts to bend the agency to his own personal service and political purposes, in ways unlike those of any previous presidents. This is especially relevant now, as news this week has revealed that members of the Secret Service close to Trump may have actively participated in attempts to derail the certification of the 2020 election by Congress. Recommended.
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