Acting Secret Service Director Joseph Clancy has said he regrets the blunders the agency has made in recent years but that he is committed to restoring the public trust.
"We're embarrassed and we're angry that we've put ourselves in this position," Clancy told
Washington's Top News in an exclusive interview.
"We are sincerely committed. This is a very important mission. We know the American people are counting on us, and we don't like the position we've put ourselves in and we own that. We take full responsibility for that."
In 2009, the Secret Service was under fire after two reality-TV personalities sneaked into a state dinner at the White House. In 2011, there was a questionable investigation into a shooting near the White House, and in 2012, the agency was rocked by a prostitution scandal in Cartagena, Colombia.
Problems continued in 2014 with a public drunkenness episode in the Netherlands during a presidential visit.
The agency faced more questions after a mentally disturbed Iraq War veteran scaled a fence and advanced deep inside the White House.
Clancy told WTP that increases in staff would help restore the image of the agency.
"It will allow us to get more personnel out to training. That's really critical. We've seen that some of our errors in the past have been because we haven't trained to the level that we want to train," Clancy said.