The US Secret Service confirmed to DailyMail.com that Assistant Director Tony Ornato quit the organization on Tuesday, some two months after the House of Representatives’ select committee hearings on January 6 made his name a lightning rod.
After 25 years of faithful service, Anthony Ornato resigned from the U.S. Secret Service today in good standing, according to Secret Service Special Agent Kevin Helgert.
Before and after the attack on the US Capitol last year, Ornato was a significant figure in Trump’s inner circle.
Ornato characterized the former president as growing ‘irate’ when Secret Service officials declined to transport him to the US Capitol with his supporters, according to Cassidy Hutchinson, the former assistant to Mark Meadows, Trump’s last chief of staff, who testified before a panel of senators in June.
According to Ornato, Trump reportedly said, “I’m the f***ing president, take me up to the Capitol immediately.”
Anthony Ornato, assistant director of the US Secret Service, has retired, the organization told DailyMail.com. He was once a member of Donald Trump’s White House staff (pictured in October 2020 next to Trump aide Hope Hicks)
She said that when an agent urged that they go back to the White House, Trump lunged for the wheel of the vehicle carrying him as president.
Calls for Ornato to come forward and provide his story were made by both sides in response to Hutchinson’s incendiary testimony.
Although he avoided speaking in public, he twice met this year with the Capitol riot committee in private.
Hutchinson’s account was disputed by Ornato, according to those close to him, but that was compounded when other former White House employees accused him of lying.
After Hutchinson’s hearing, former Mike Pence assistant Olivia Troye said on Twitter, “Tony Ornato definitely appears to dispute talks he’s obviously had.”
Those of us who worked with Tony are aware of his allegiances. He ought to provide a sworn statement.
Tony Ornato lied about me too, said Alyssa Farah, a different former Trump worker.
‘During the protests at Lafayette sq in 2020, I told Mark Meadows & Ornato they needed to warn press staged there before clearing the square. Meadows replied: “we aren’t doing that.” Tony later lied &said the exchange never happened. He knows it did,’ Farah claimed.
Cassidy Hutchinson, the assistant to Donald Trump’s final chief of staff Mark Meadows, told the January 6 committee in June that Ornato described the ex-president becoming ‘irate’ when agents refused to take him to the US Capitil (she’s pictured motioning toward her clavicle, as she claimed Ornato did when he was recalling Trump’s actions against a Secret Service agent)
During the proceedings, Ornato’s name became a lightning rod, and correspondence between him and Hutchinson were also exposed.
One of the committee’s two Republicans, Rep. Adam Kinzinger, seized on their assertions to challenge Ornato’s denials.
There seems to be a significant theme here… Tony Ornato enjoys lying, said the Illinois congressman.
Ornato, who temporarily left his law enforcement position in December 2019 to serve as the former president’s deputy chief of staff, was exceptionally close to Trump for a Secret Service agent. He subsequently went back to the organization.
In a statement that left any references to the former president or the January 6 probe, he informed CNN on Monday that he was leaving his position to pursue “private sector” employment.
I did leave my job today in order to work in the private sector. After more than 25 years of dedicated devotion to my nation, including working for the last five presidents, I resigned from the U.S. Secret Service,’ Ornato said the media source.
“I have been preparing for this shift for more than a year and have long intended to retire.”
According to reports, he declined to specify his future job but said he would not be working for Trump or one of his affiliated companies.