WASHINGTON — The director of the Secret Service announced Thursday that he will retire at the end of the month after a 27-year career with the agency charged with protecting the president of the United States.
Director James M. Murray has accepted a position at social media company Snap, which is known for its Snapchat messaging app, an agency spokesman said.
Mr. Murray was appointed by President Donald J. Trump in 2019 after Mr. Trump became disillusioned with the agency’s director at the time, Randolph D. Alles. The Director of the Secret Service is appointed by the President and does not require Senate confirmation.
“Joining the Secret Service was the easiest decision I have ever made,” Mr. Murray wrote in a letter to agency officials on Thursday. “The decision that it was time to move on was one of the hardest, though.”
In April, Mr. Murray told Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas, whose growing department includes the Secret Service, that he planned to retire and take a job outside the government, Mr. Murray said in the letter.
In a joint statement, President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden expressed their appreciation for Mr. Murray. “We are extremely grateful for his service to our country and our family,” they said.
The Secret Service has come under the spotlight in recent days as more details emerged about Mr Trump’s actions on January 6, 2021, when a mob of his supporters attacked the Capitol in an attempt to stop the routine process of certifying the results of a presidential election .
Mr. Trump’s defense was with him that day. In testimony last week before a House committee investigating the attack, a former White House aide said she had been told Mr Trump had tried to grab the steering wheel of the president’s car and lunged at his top agent from Secret Service after being told he couldn’t go to the Capitol.
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