Attendance. Knowing our panelists who will be out here in a minute, tonight is going to be one of those engage programs that is both informative and highly entertaining. These guys know how to tell a story. And its a rare treat to have the curtain pulled back from those who are on the front lines of protecting the president and the first family. Were honored to be joined tonight by three former secret Service Agents whose combined years of Service Almost approach 82 years. Im privileged to have Larry Buendorf with us, 22year veteran of the secret service. Larry was honored with the secret Service Valor Award for his role in stopping an assassination attempt on president gerald ford in september of 1975 in sacramento. Later, larry served 25 years as the security chief with the United States olympic committee. Joe clancy is with us tonight. Joe served on the protective details of four president s, including president bush, or trailblazer, as he would have called him by his secret service code name. Mrs. Bush was tempo. President bush was trailblazer. Joes nearly 30year career with the service culminated in 2015, when he. [ applause ] well, thank you all we have a fantastic program and interesting information on the secret service, how it runs, and a lot of back stories you will find fascinating. So lets get started. Joe director clancy i should say, as a former director of the secret service can you set the scene of the history of the secret service because it wasnt always about protection. Thats correct, spence, first it is unusual for agents to be sitting on stage. Typically were stage left or right talking into our sleeves but talking into these mics are a challenge. I want to give you warning because of our training any sudden movements might create [ laughter ] we noticed a couple people didnt applaud when we walked in. The history of the secret service, its a tremendous history over 150 years. It started april 14, 1865, civil war theres a lot of counter fit currency and the treasury secretary went in april 14, 1965 and said we have rampant currency and have to do something about it and lincoln gave a it green light to start the new agency, the secret service, he had ace orders and that night president lincoln went to fords theater to take in a play, our american cousin and we know what happened at fords netheater. From there we continue to do investigations, from paper investigations, the counterfeit currency to the plastic, credit card, and the digital cyber world which were one of the best in the world at as well. Most people think of the secret service you think of the protection assignment. The Protection Mission when you think of the secret service, 1901 after president mackinnoc s assassination is when we started to protect president s and it continued to progress taking candidates after Robert Kennedys assassination, we started taking heads of state to children, wives, spouses, well get into that as we go into the program. Can you talk about the Training Academy in beltsville, maryland, and the total number of employed agents. This president ial campaign coming up we have 24 candidates. How much man power is that going to require . Yeah its a considerable challenge. Every Campaign Season is a challenge for the secret service but i think our history proves we have done a very good job handling all that. Its a tremendous challenge for our men and women in the secret service and to their credit. They do a marvelous job in my view. When you look at the history of the country, most of those world events, the secret service was behind the scenes allowing those events to take place and lot of it has to do with our training, we have a terrific Training Facility in bellsville, maryland and will you see terrific examples where that training paid off in world events. I think we have a picture that happened of an event that happened at the white house. Tell us a little bit about that. Normally you see secret Service Agents in nice suits, the ear piece in, but you never see their weapons. Heres a long gun out. What happened here . Sure. So i remember president bush just coming back from a visit out of town and we came back to the white house and when you get in the gates of the white house theres a little sense of relief youve accomplished your mission and theres a little bit of a deep breath but as we pulled up to the oval office area where he will walk up to the oval office we got over the radio that there was a fence jumper who was over on the east part of the complex by the Treasury Building so i was sitting in the right, front seat of the limousine and had to turn to president bush and say we have a fence jumper and were going to have to sit in the vehicle for a few minutes until we get this issue resolved. He said, a fence jumper where, he started looking behind and looking through, i was actually glad for that response. But then after a few seconds goes on you cant see the fence jumper and im not hearing it is all clear yet and the president said i got to get to work, i got to get into the oval office. And it took about three minutes but all that time i knew the uniformed officers and the agents they were going to get this individual and i was confident that well just stay in an Armored Vehicle because you dont know if someone jumps a fence, are they armed, what do they have, so stay in a safe area. Could we evacuate yes but i had confidence we were going to get him and we did in a matter of seconds and we let president bush out, i know he was smirking because he knew i was sweat tlug my suit. For those who know president bush, he likes to run on time and doesnt like to wait very often, so. Hey, larry, in 1975 you saved president fords life. Tell us that story. I think we have a video of the attempts assassination attempt and you can talk us through that day. Okay. It was midmorning in sacramento when president ford left the hotel to walk to the State Capitol to speak with brown jr. And speak to the state legislature. This was part of the president s exam pain to lock up the campaign to lock up the nomination and he worked the crowd, a friendly crowd accompanied by aides and secret service agtss, the president reached for every hand in sight. Somebody, i a young Woman Holding a gun appeared at the president s side. A secret Service Agent grabbed the gun and wrestled a young woman to the ground and moved the president swiftly to the capital. Well and there you are apprehending the wouldbe assassins. First i should have had a haircut. [ laughter ] at least thats what my mother said when she heard about it. But i was working the shift, the morning shift, and the president was scheduled to speak at the capitol he walks out of the hotel, motorcade is there, scheduled, a large crowd across the street waiting to see him. He walks out, nice sunny day in california, he goes, i think ill walk, it was just across the park and the Capital Building was right there. That immediately causes a scramble with the agents and police and trying to move the crowd in the right direction to get it so theres a pathway and move the crowd across to one side of the sidewalk so as he walked along he can shake hands. My position at the time was right at his left shoulder, so as hes walking along shabing hands shaking hands im concentrating on his hands kind of in a downward motion, he doesnt want everybody to grab too long, take his watch, whatever, so im kind of looking down. Out in the crowd is a member of the Charlie Manson family, lynnet squeaky fromm who happened to be carrying a. 45 strapped to her ankle. She was back a couple people in the crowd and as he is shaking hands i suddenly see this hand come up with something in it. At that time didnt know it was a weapon. But i stepped in front of the president to stop the hand from coming up, because i didnt want him to get hit with whatever it was. The minute i hit it, i knew it was a gun. So i yelled out gun. All my very best friends that are with the president , they leave, with the president. [ laughter ] trained well, trained well, part of our training program. Youre on your own, buddy. So shes screaming and the crowd is screaming and i got hold of the gun and got the gun here pushing, another thing, mr. Director, i didnt have my vest on, so im thinking that i dont know if theres more to this than is going to happen but i know im not going to let go of her and were pushing back the crowd and you see the gun, i got the gup girl, shes cre screaming, i keep pushing her away, the president is gone with the agents, i drop her down to the ground and some of the agents from the back of the crowd came forward and i noticed one of the agent frz the shift and handed him the gun and proceeded to cuff her which is happening now as you see. Once she was cuffed i turned her over to the agent that was there from our Intelligence Division and the police went back and rejoined the shift. Pretty fast and furious and matter of seconds and then you have a chance to sit back and think about how fast it went down. [ applause ] what did she say. Supposedly she said it didnt go off. I did grab it and it caught my hand and for months i kept jabbing the wound to make sure it stay open, i kept going, you seeing this. It healed way too fast. [ laughter ] so it was just a little cut, anyhow, i think she might have been pulling back and when i hit it i stopped the slide. She didnt have a round shame bereted, if she didnt have a Round Chamber because if she did it would have went through me and the president because i didnt have a vest on. Interesting thing, we got back to air force one and i got pulled off to remain in sacramento to be interviewed by the fbi, need to do once theres an attempt like that. Mrs. Ford had gone in another direction so when he boarded the plane she turned to him and said, well, how was your day mr. President. Not so good. Well, i know that the country better for your duty that day and taking care of our president. September 11, 2001, is a day that changed our country forever. Can you, nick and joe, walk us through that day. Talk to us about sort of the fog of that day and trying to determine who was trying to decapitate our leadership of our country and sort of how you dealt with it throughout the day. Sure its one of those moments in history that, you know, everyone can pretty much identify and recall where you were that day. For some reason i had come in early that morning. The president , i didnt accompany him, i waited for the president to return so for whatever reason i went to the white house early that morning. I was actually working out. I had espn on, watching whatever sports highlights and then i saw the first plane just like everyone else. It was that second one when we realized that we were under attack. Mrs. Bush was at the u. S. Capitol at the time. So it took some time to see what was happening. We wanted to get her away from the capitol. We had known that there were three planes down. The pentagon had just the plane had just hit the pentagon and i decided to go and connect with mrs. Bush as we relocated her from the capitol and at that time as we mentioned earlier in the green room there were about six planes thatter with still unidentified at the time after the plane hitting the pentagon. It was a challenging day because United States hadnt been attacked, you know, since pearl harbor and you look at the oklahoma bombing but in this case here we had the president in florida who wanted to come back. You had the first lady who wanted to be teamed up with her husband. So communication, we restricted communication because of the nature of what was happening and then the president was relocated to louisiana as everyone got to see. And it took some time. The president wanted to come back. We werent sure what was happening yet, the airspace was controlled and it wasnt until later in the evening that the decision was made by the president that he was ambidexterousant that he was going to address the nations ad adamant that he was going to address the nation. Where were you joe. I was in japan. With treasury secretary oneal, it was the evening, went to my room and turned on the tv and saw the aircraft crashing into the World Trade Center. Went to seshlgt secretary one oneal, and dont had you he seen it yet, we immediately tried to get all aircraft back to the states and took about 24 hours to get military flight back to washington, d. C. Tell us a little bit about post9 11 with respect to the development of the department of Homeland Security and sort of that day revealed a lot of things about how we treated security and how our government ran with respect to this kind of an attack and sort of the deficiencies that were uncovered and sort of how the department of Homeland Security came about. Sure. You know. Again, it developed after 9 11. You know, at the time, the secret service was under the department of u. S. Treasury. You had other entities. You had alcohol, tobacco to and firearms under treasury. You had other departments under justice and so Law Enforcement and Intelligence Community were in different agencies. U. S. Coast guard was under transition portation and it wasnt until dhs that put it all under one roof and where you had all of the Law Enforcement outside of those in the department of justice. So you had this. And took some time. There was growing pangs with it, just like anything else, but it it was one of mosaof thos moments in history where you see the department was created, everyone was under one roof, we were able to communicate. We were able to share a bit better than previous. And then it was getting it was as you mentioned earlier, it was, then, how does the country move forward. Right. After such a tragic event like that. Let alone the new creation of departments and other things that the department of defense were doing and other men and women across the whole United States that were trying to strengthen and make the homeland safe but it was then the president and first lady, how to move and get the folks moving. Because i remember the president saying, if he just stayed in the white house, folks in new york and d. C. May not go out. The other parts of the country were effected but those in new york and d. C. , you know, it was right here at home. When you talk to the folks, you know, up in new york that lived it, it was getting the country back, so it was creating movements. Yeah, i think a lot of you will remember just a few days after, there were couple things, few day afz the attack at World Trade Center president bush actually went to new york city and stood on the rubble pile and thats the famous video if you tour the museum you see the bull horn he gave those remarks from. So it was that going to new york immediately after 9 11 and really sort of letting the American People know well get through this as a country. And a even bigger event as many know the yankees were in the world series and mlb debated whether to call it or or to delay, talk to us about that event. I think this is one of the seminole events in president bushs presidency that really unified the country. Zb zbll. Yeah, actually a back story. Prior to , if you remember, the president was hosting a strategy meeting at camp david shortly after. And we were departing going to camp david and i was accompanying the president on the trip and marine one were on the south ground and the press were on the south ground of the white house and not sure why, when the president came out of the oval office he kind of singled me over and i wasnt sure if he was calling me over, if there was someone behind me, i didnt want to turnaround because of all of the press, well, he had come over and he said, guess what, were going to the world series, Yankees Stadium. I went, what . But thats how he was. He brought everyone he just calmed the whole situation down. You know, it was a stressful period and i was in shock, i mean, were getting ready to go to camp david, but he just calmed everyone down, nick, nikki, were going to Yankees Stadium the world series and i forgot the yankees were in the world series. Wed tease each other as big yankee fans. As we prepared to go, new york city, i mean, we had all forces to assist, all of the resources, and those that get a chance to watch the espn documentary will see the behind the scenes, the stress and the build up and everyone in the stadium had gone tlud metal detectors, Billy Crystal was can here, if we have to go through metal detectors were going to do it was a unique time, extremely stressful, with the world series of major league baseball, and you have the president of the United States going not just to the stadium but going to the field, to the mound, to throw out the first pitch. The planning between new york city support, the other federal partners, made the event extremely full. The planning to allow him to go out to the mound, if you saw the video, he went to the mound, all the way to the rubber on the mound to throw out the pitch without any security right around him. All of that was possible because of the planning. Tell us a little bit about where agents were. Yeah, so we had, theres a photo baseball fans picked up right away on it because during the world series and playoffs you have the two extra umpires. Well, there was an extra one. [ laughter ] extra extra one. But, again, just as in the incident with larry, and the agentsnd assassination attempt of president ford they all left him thats what were trainin d trainingedtraininge traininged trained to do, to get you out of the way. Again, unique situation. It was, just a the planning that had gone in between him going to the mound, whether or not he was actually going to stay for part of the game, stay for the game, where he would sit. There was a lot that had gone in. We had excellent support. The resources were tremendous. We had the umpires. We had the airspace of course was co