Supreme Court Seeks Increased Security for Justices

Ryan talks with former FBI Special Agent-in-Charge Rich Frankel about the Supreme Court’s warning to Congress over rising threats against the justices.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So Ryan Gorman Show Podcast presented by Farah and Farah
Accident Attorneys TAPA.

Speaker 2 (00:07):
Let's bring in former FBI Special Agent in charge, Rich
Frankel joins us again. Rich, it's great to talk to
you this morning. Yesterday you had Supreme Court Justices Amy Coney,
Barrett and Alena Kagan on Capitol Hill testifying that the
amount of threats that they're getting just keeps increasing year

(00:28):
after year after year and they need more security. Tell
us about the situation involving Supreme Court justices and how
much are they at risk?

Speaker 3 (00:42):
So the risk has actually grown quite a bit to
the justices. You know, back in back in the day,
as we like to say, they would ride bikes or
drive the wrong cars to the courthouse, go in and
there would be just a handful of Supreme Court officers
there to protect them. Now that has dramatically increased over time.

(01:06):
The Supreme Court police force has grown dramatically. But they're
asking for another increase, one that hasn't happened for a while,
so that they can have three new areas of security
or three enhanced areas. One would be the courthouse. They're
the only ones that don't have one of those pre
screening facilities outside of the outside of the building, so

(01:28):
that if somebody comes to the courthouse with a dangerous weapon,
at least it's taken care of before they enter into
the Supreme Court. They're also asking for cyber protection, and
then they're asking for more executive protection style assistance what
we would, you know, think of as a secret service
but for the justices, and that would also be handled

(01:49):
by the Supreme Court Police Force.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
And you've had some serious threats against these justices. I mean,
you know that plot that targeted Brett cabin Awe. That
was someone who was right there outside his home. I mean,
that could have turned really, really tragic fast. And then
you had Amy Cony Barrett testifying yesterday that her security

(02:13):
detail center home with a bullet proof vest after the
leak Dobbs decisions. So you know, there have been some
we're not talking about just anybody writing some email or
posting something on social media about these justices. They've been
serious enough that we almost had a potential assassination with
Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Cony Barrett was wearing a bullet

(02:34):
proof vest on.

Speaker 3 (02:34):
The way home, correct. And we've had other justices that
have had swatting incidents, you know, where we called to
their homes, you know, with guns drawn because they think
there's an incident going on. And then there have been
protests at several of the homes, which has never happened before,
and those protests, while they have not gotten violent, they

(02:56):
have gotten closer and closer to the point where the
justice have had to call local law enforcement in for protection.

Speaker 1 (03:03):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (03:04):
The you know, there has been a handoff by the
US Marshals to the Supreme Court for the protection of
the justices, and uh that was done without I think
an increase in uh uh you know, uh funding, And
so now they're they're saying that listen, we want to
have a true detail assigned for each of the justices,

(03:24):
not just you know, uh, you know, a couple of
people here, a couple of people there. Now it's going
to be a more uh professionally run uh executive protection
for each justice and basically they'll be on full time
with them.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Former FBI Special Agent in Charge Rich Franco with us
this morning. Rich, really appreciate time and insight. Thanks so much.

Speaker 3 (03:46):
Thank you, have a great day.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
I do want to note that Republican Senator John Kennedy.
He was asked about all of this yesterday and his
response is basically like, Uh, where're gonna get the money from?
H Like, I get they want these security increases, but
they're lawmakers who want more security too. We're getting a
lot of threats and you know, money's not made on trees.
I always think it's interesting when you know you have

(04:10):
politicians from from either party, they kind of pick and shoes,
mostly like Republicans will say, we don't have the money
for that. Well, like, how do we figure out what
is important and what's not because it seems like they're
throwing money at just about everything. I mean days they
had four one hundred million dollars to put a gold
toilet on a plane in the cutter, right. I mean,
but on this specific issue, you know, if something happened

(04:35):
to one of these Supreme Court justices, talk about bad
for the country. Yeah, I mean that that's not good.
And what happened to Brett Kavanaugh that kind of didn't
get as much attention as it should have. And it's
probably because it was Brett Kavanaugh and how the mainstream
media views him. But that was a serious plot targeting him,
and you had a guy who was fully armed outside

(04:57):
his home, ready to kill him. Luckily he was intercepted
before anything could happen. But these threats are legit against
these justices, regardless of what you think about them. He
can't have one of them getting taken out.

Speaker 1 (05:11):
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