What's Inside The Secret Service Headquarters?
- [Sam] The United States Secret Service, known for their elite special agents and fleet of heavily armored vehicles, their primary mission is one we're all familiar with, protecting the president of the United States. - Excuse me. - But with a mission so vital and a team so elite, I had always wondered what was hidden behind the scenes? What sort of facilities and technology are they working with? Well, the answer lies right here in Washington, D.C. Nestled in the heart of downtown, due east of the White House stands the top secret headquarters for the Secret Service. After months of back and forth communications, security reviews, and background checks, my team was miraculously granted the incredibly rare access to take our cameras inside and bring you along for a never before seen tour of the headquarters of the United States Secret Service. (suspenseful music) (tires screeching) (suspenseful music) (cars whirring) So we are officially inside the Secret Service Headquarters.
Feels a little bit like we shouldn't be here, quite secretive. - Hi, good morning. - Good morning. - Welcome to the headquarters of the United States Secret Service. - I was just saying, it feels a little bit like we shouldn't be here almost, like it's so secretive, but thanks for having us. It's a beautiful building. - Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, thank you so much. We're so excited to have you.
- So this building, we're like almost in the heart of D.C., right? It's like half a mile from the White House. - That's correct. - I assume that's strategic to be here, - Yes. - close to the action? - Yes, we're considered the flagship, we're located here in D.C., but we have offices spread
throughout the United States. - Gotcha. - So when most people think about the Secret Service, they think about our protective mission. But that is just a small piece of what we do. (suspenseful music) We have just under 8,000 employees, and I would say about 50% of those employees are the special agents, those are the ones that you think of when you think of the Secret Service. Black suits, sunglasses, earpiece, they're doing criminal and protective mission.
We do things like counterfeit currency, cyber enabled crime, and then the work we do in our forensic services division related to fingerprint and handwriting analysis, and the technical assets we bring to our national security events. And a lot of those things are mainly done here at the headquarters in Washington, D.C. (suspenseful music) - Sam, welcome to our VirTra-300 Interactive Training Simulator. What this is right here, it's a 300 degree immersive simulator, and we use this for our judgment portion of training.
Alright, this is not a tactical trainer, this is purely use of force training for our students. And what we use this for is we bring our students in, it's a controlled environment, and we can sit back and watch how they view a certain scenario and evaluate their decisions along the way. The whole system is on, it is totally immersive, a lot going on, a lot of decisions to make. And we evaluate them that way. It's a building block approach.
- Yeah, it's fascinating. Really cool technology and a lot of different toys here, it looks like. What do we got going on? - So it starts with their pistol. It's a Glock 19, this is our standard service pistol. And what this is, it's an actual gun that has just been fitted by VirTra to have this little laser in it right here.
We have a mag filled with CO2. It gets inserted into the weapon. (gun cocking) And just like a normal weapon, it's ready to use. When I'm training students in here, I tell them all the time, this is not a video game. This is real, this is what you'll experience, and it starts with these tools here. One of the really cool capabilities of this is we can dim the lights on these screens.
Whatever is illuminated by the flashlight or what would be is what you'll see on the screen. That's the basic rundown of the system, except for one really cool piece of kit. - Okay. - And that's this.
This is our Threat-Fire stress-inducing shock belt. We wanna put 'em into that, oh my goodness, what's gonna happen, I'm in trouble kind of stress. So what we're gonna do for you is we're gonna give you a condensed version of what we give our students, which is a building block approach. The first drill is gonna be some use of force training. Alright, what I wanna see from you is, first of all, talk to people. Then if you see them do something, you react how you think you would react, okay? - Okay.
- Make it as real as you can in your own head. - Okay. - Okay? That's what we're gonna do first. - Alrighty, I'm excited. - Awesome, this is gonna be great.
♪ Some rise, some fall ♪ - Here, slight bend at the waist - Okay. - without hunching. This is just gonna be a use of force drill. It's just a drill, there's no scenario attached to it.
So here you go, it's on you now. - Let me see your hand. (gun booming) What are you doing? - I'm going away.
(gun booming) - Oh, don't shoot. - Back away. - Okay, I'm going. - Back away. What are you reaching for? What are you reaching for? Okay, put that down. Ma'am, what are you reaching for? Hands up, hands up. (gun booming) - Whoa, whoa, take it easy, okay? (man whistling) - Good morning. - Need a hand up
on that stair. Sir, how are you today? - Who the **** are you? - I'm just doing my job. - Okay, you're the cops. - No. - I get it.
I got something for you. - Nope, would you put that down please? Sir, drop the bottle. - Take this. - Drop the bottle, drop the bottle.
(gun booming) - Alright, actual stop. What we can do now, really cool feature of this system is we can play back everything that you just went through. - Okay. - Not only will you see it, you'll see where you shot, where your impacts were. So we'll get to see how good your accuracy was, - Okay. - whether you're good
or whether you are not so good. - Oh boy. - But we'll see. Let's do that first shot, Jack? (gun booming) - Ooh. - Oh, right in the crotch. (gun booming) - Follow on shot was pretty good. Break it down into those three basic categories.
Means, does he have the tools? Opportunity, can he get to me? Intent, does he mean to do it, or is it reasonable for me to believe that he means to do it? Here he comes, and at that point. Yeah, it's too late at this point. So the way this scenario is filmed, if he gets that close, you're gonna pay the penalty. - Yeah, it's dead, gotcha. Now, it seemed like a simple task at first was actually one of the most stressful things I have ever done. Your brain is wired to focus on what's directly in front of you. - So 10.87, that's the time it took your mind,
even though you knew that was when deadly force was authorized, that's the time it took your mind to be like, okay, now squeeze the trigger. - But I also had to be aware of all of my surroundings at the same time. It's not easy. And I gained a lot of respect for Secret Service Agents, and really anyone who's in law enforcement and tasked with going into real world situations just like this.
Of course, what I'm seeing could never possibly duplicate the stress of what you'd feel in real life. But the 300 degree field of view, along with the immersive surround sound definitely made it pretty realistic. But probably the most effective part of the training, and definitely the most humbling, was what happened after each scenario was finished, I received a full debrief from the instructor who was standing by evaluating every decision that I made. Yeah, it was a privilege getting to check this out, thanks so much for the training. - No problem, man. It's great to have you here, appreciate it.
(upbeat music) - So what we're looking at here is literally a 3D model, - Correct. - of a venue, right? I think you were saying it was the Republican National Convention, right? - Correct. - And you can study this, and look at it, and show the agents so that they're more prepared and know how to, you know, safely defend it.
- We actually have to go through every single room, every single inch of the area we have to kind of scan, and we pretty much walk around the entire area. It's a lot of work and the machinery is heavy, but we do that along with taking thousands and thousands of photos, and we bring that back and we visualize that in a 3D virtual environment. Here we have similar to what we saw earlier, but this one has touchscreen capabilities. So we want our agents and our unity officers to have more versatility in their training, right? So we want them to have this on their iPad, we want them to have it on their smartphones, on the go, anywhere they want to.
- Oh, so you can actually add barriers, okay. - And you can add vehicles as well. - Perfect, you can literally build out the exact scenario, infrastructure, everything you need as virtual. - Yeah, and you know, we can have the office building setups too, our trailers, even generators too, certain electrical generators, we can drop 'em in wherever we need them, that way our agents know exactly which areas need to be protected. And this could be like an office setup right here.
(suspenseful music) - Welcome to the Secret Service Ordinance Lab. - Wow, there's a lot going on here. (suspenseful music) - We have the lab for three primary reasons. First and foremost, this is a working classroom. We also use it for scientific testing.
Just like that door we saw in the lobby, they pay me money to shoot things. So we have this collection. Part of my job is to preserve it for the future, right? So not the world's largest collection by any means, I know probably you have more in your basement, but we have credible and relevant law enforcement, military, and sporting weapon systems, and other things which I'm about to show you. This is a Desert Eagle 50 caliber Action Express, Smith & Wesson Model 500, first sub machine gun right here, AK-47, or M9 Beretta. I sneak up on you, it's charged up.
(suspenseful music) Come up and go to work. If you pull this credit card case out of the bad guy's waistband, and you might find out that it is in fact a single shot, it's clear, 22 caliber pistol. It fits in my cell phone case, it's a two shot pistol. I have been given special permission to fire a two millimeter silent weapon inside here for you. It's not a problem.
(gun squeaks) Alright, there you go. (laughing together) You can kill somebody with your foot, but it's much easier with your hand. Looks like a lighter and it functions as a lighter.
It's a two shot gas propelled dart. Alright, what questions do you have? What do you want to talk about? Shoulder fire high explosive weapon systems, chemical warfare agents, fire, smoke, biological warfare agents, blood blister nerve and choking, rickettsia, toxins, viruses, what are you into? (suspenseful music) - So we have a very diverse professional workforce here at the Secret Service. We have the agents and then we have these administrative, and technical, and professional staff.
And they are highly specialized in the things that we do. Our forensic services division has forensic scientists that work to analyze fingerprint, and ink analysis, and threat letters that may come in against our protectees. So their job is essentially to support that investigative mission. (upbeat music) - Welcome to the International Ink Library.
It is the largest ink library in the world and it is unique to the Secret Service. It houses over 14,000 different inks, dating back to the early 1920s, and it's still being added to today. - So I didn't even know this existed in the Secret Service.
- Yeah. - You know, you think Secret Service protection, but you guys are using these, right, for people who write, you know, threatening letters to the president, you can analyze them, that's why these exist, is that accurate? - Yeah, so we can use this library as a source for comparison of inks used on threat letters, but also we can compare inks on secured documents like social security cards, passports, etcetera. (suspenseful music) So I have a demo set up for you here. So if we were to get a threat letter into our lab, how would we extract the ink from the letter in order to compare it to our library? To get started, we are first gonna need to take the ink off the actual threat letter itself.
And so we're going to take hole punches of the ink, place it in this little vial right here. - Okay. - And so how we're gonna do that is take anywhere where the ink.
- [Sam] So even that small is enough, just? - That small. - Wow. - Usually I take anywhere from 3 to 10, I would say. But if you wanna go give it a try. - Sure, yeah.
- I usually try to focus on areas where there's, you know, a lot of ink deposit - A lot of ink. - or you know, maybe where the inks cross each other. The pyridine is extracting any of the ink that is on the hole punches that we took. - Okay. - If you can kind of see it in here, it's really small, - Oh, I do, yeah. - but the ink is extracting off that hole punch. - Wow.
- And so I can pull it up. - There it is. Is that black? - This is black, yeah. - Yeah. - So we're gonna set that in our little chamber right here. As the solvent works its way up, we'll start seeing the ink separate out into distinct bands. - Hmm. So as technology's increasing, you'd think that people aren't writing as much, but you guys are still getting a bunch of threat letters and. - No, I get that question
more times than you know, and what I always tell people is you would be shocked how much handwriting there still is. We still see signatures, we still see threat letters, we still see, if you can think it, it's probably written. - Wow. Now, the ink lab is actually used for more than just identifying ink samples. It also functions as a state of the art fingerprinting lab as well.
If you think about it, anytime you have a handwritten letter, you also have the hand of the person who wrote the letter. And unless they're smart enough to wear a glove and be extremely careful, their fingerprint is likely going to get left behind on that sheet of paper. With those fingerprints, the Secret Service Forensics Department can then extract them, and along with the ink samples we just learned about, they can then match the fingerprint to a specific culprit.
- Alright, so I received this letter from David, he did his ink analysis on it. I'm a fingerprint examiner, so I'm gonna look at this letter for fingerprints. And we do fingerprints after, because it can be somewhat destructive to the ink, so we don't want to inhibit their test. So we work in a fume hood 'cause the reagents can be hazardous. So I just pour it in, I make sure that the document is completely wet, let the excess drip off.
And then I've got my test tube rack that we use as a drying rack here. And then we're gonna let that dry. So fingerprints are kind of small, so we use magnifiers to be able to see things easier.
So I'm gonna just look at every part of this letter just to see, and look at this guy right here. - Yeah. - So that is a palm print. - You were right. - Because of the size, yeah. How'd you know it's big? - It's big. So the palms are much bigger than the fingers, so it's pretty easy to identify. And my guess is that it's the writer's palm, because somebody would've set their hand down to write these words. - Of course.
Now when I think fingerprint analysis, my immediate thought went to kind of like the FBI and what they do there. Is there a relationship that exists between the two of you guys or you kind of doing everything independently? - So we work well with all federal agencies, but we wouldn't examine the same item of evidence, because there could be potentially be a conflict there. So this letter would come to me, but the FBI actually is one that houses the federal database. So I will search the repository of fingerprints that they have.
- Okay. - So that's kind of the joint aspect in this instance. (gentle instrumental music) - Now, if you've ever been to Washington, D.C., you've probably spent time in one of the numerous museums scattered all across the city.
However, the one museum you won't be able to visit is right here in the Secret Service Headquarters. Open only to Secret Service employees and select guests, this museum contains some incredible artifacts dating back to 1865 all the way to today. (gentle instrumental music) Now this might be the most fascinating. This is a 1941 letter from the Library of Congress sent after the Pearl Harbor attacks to move things like the Articles of Confederation, the Declaration of Independence, the Magna Carta, the Gettysburg Address transported from the National Archives here in D.C. for safety.
Now as impressive as the headquarters building is here in Washington, D.C., it only tells half of the story. The other half lies 15 miles to the northeast in the town of Laurel, Maryland. Comprised of almost 500 acres of land, six miles of roadway, and 31 buildings, this robust training center exists to train Secret Service Special Agents. In a single year, hundreds of recruits will undergo extensive training in marksmanship, use of force tactics, emergency medical techniques, water survival, and event protection, equipping them with everything they need to know about performing their job to the highest level. Alright, now, if you're a fan of the channel and are someone who's interested in military, aerospace, and defense, there's a new podcast that launched that does a great job of simplifying everything going on. It's called "Weapons and Warfare", hosted by Straight Arrow News.
It's a weekly show that provides in-depth coverage on military operations and technology developments going on all across the world. From our nation's frontline defenders to some of the most fascinating stories in military operations, it's entertaining, it's accurate, and it was also founded to stay neutral, reporting only on the facts, which is definitely a breath of fresh air in today's world. If you're interested in checking out the show, you can visit San.com/eckholm,
a link I've also included down in the description below, where you'll have access to the show's latest episodes. And a huge thanks to Straight Arrow News for supporting the channel and making videos like this possible. (suspenseful music) - Sam, welcome to the Deal Historical Garage at Secret Service Rally Training Center in Beltsville, Maryland, where we have historical limousines from the President Reagan administration to the Trump administration. - And these are stunning vehicles.
I think when anyone thinks Secret Service, this is what they're thinking about. - They're thinking of the agents driving the black limousines and riding in the black suburbans as well throughout history up to and including today. - So with vehicles dating back to the '80s, are these still operable? Can they be driven today? - The key word is operable, because they're not operational, but they're operable. So when we don't have students in training out here, the instructors will take them out on campus, drive them around, and make sure that the vehicles are operable and driven on a routine basis, and then brought back in here and cleaned up. (suspenseful music) Starting with the 1993 Cadillac that was utilized in President Clinton's administration. This is one of three parades that came off the manufacturer assembly line in Detroit, Michigan, where it was cut, stretched, and raised, and then the ballistic material was in place at the armorers.
- Yeah, it's a beautiful vehicle. I was curious, is this custom made for the Secret Service, this one? Or is this a model they sell to the public, just modified? Yeah. - Custom made, no modifications for the public, obviously not for commercial use. - That would be pretty sweet. - I drove this one with President Clinton in here domestically and overseas.
- I mean, I'm sure this was a pretty sweet ride to be in while you were just cruising around town, huh? - It is, you just gotta soak it in, right? Understanding where you are and that you're standing, or sitting in this case, next to history. Fun fact here too about the seals, the presidential seals and the flags are only utilized when the president's in the vehicle on a on the record movement. So anytime that the president is on an off the record movement, there'll be no flags and seals. But then the president is an official movement, when he is in the vehicle and moving, and we'll have the flags and the seals on the vehicle. - Yeah, it's definitely tight in here, but a very comfortable ride, I will say. - Yep.
You know, President Clinton's about 6'2" to 6'3", and when he would have guests in here seated here, and as many as three in the jump seats, you can tell by just our knees touching here how tight it could be for the ride. - I don't know, it's just kind of interesting just thinking about the conversations that were had in the back of here, probably decisions that were made. I mean, I don't know how much you were able to hear when you were driving up there, but what was that like? - So the good thing is that I have two ear pieces in my ear, so I don't hear any conversation that was happening back here. And so all I'm doing is focusing on the road and listening to radio traffic that's coming across the radios.
- It's probably strategic. The president didn't want you to hear everything, I bet. - And I'm sure it was strategic. And it's strategic on our part as well. (suspenseful music) Moving on to the 2006 Cadillac that President Bush rode in, we utilized one of the parade vehicles from the '93 to develop additional ballistic material, ballistic capabilities with this, and creature comforts for the president and his guests riding in this.
- And there are multiple of them that were made, right? There's not just one, right, how many are actually in this service? - Well, they made eight of these, they budgeted eight parade vehicles for here. And we have the last one in in circulation right now. (suspenseful music) Couple more unique vehicles that we have here in the fleet. One of them is this 1983 Cadillac convertible, follow-up vehicle. And the follow-up vehicle is the vehicle that is utilized where the president's shift agents ride in during a motorcade movement.
- So the agents are in the back of the motorcade, kind of just, what, looking out for security stuff, is that the point? - The agents ride directly behind the limousine - Okay. - in what we term as the follow up vehicle. - So the president didn't actually ever ride on this one? - Well, President Reagan actually got into this vehicle on a couple different occasions.
One at Augusta National Golf Course, October 22nd, 1983. - And that story's pretty interesting, right? There was kind of like a hostage situation going on. - There was a hostage situation that was going on, and this vehicle actually went across the fairway, loaded President Reagan into the vehicle, and moved him off the fairway to a secure location on the grounds.
And on the wall we have a picture of the agents that were standing on the running boards here with their weapons drawn and exposed as they were moving and whisking President Reagan away. - Well, these are truly beautiful vehicles. - They are. - I hear we've got a couple more waiting outside.
I think these are the ones I'm most excited about. - Absolutely. So let's go outside and take a look at 'em. - Let's do it. (suspenseful music) (sirens wailing) - Alright, Sam, this is two of the more iconic vehicles that we have in the fleet.
The Chevy Suburban that we use as a follow-up and then the Generation 2 Cadillac used during the Obama and the Trump administration. - Yeah, these are beautiful. We see 'em all the time, right, in the media. - Absolutely. - So starting with this one, what makes it different than a normal Suburban? - So this one has ballistic capabilities with it. Our shift agents, those who are guarding the president, ride in this vehicle right behind the limo.
- And just kind of, I guess, directing our attention to this bad boy right here, the Beast, right? Why is it called the Beast? - Well, the Beast was sort of coined by the media, we call it a parade limousine. This is a formal limousine that we utilize for the president. - So what sort of upgrades were made with this latest edition versus the ones we kind of left off inside? - So this was built off a scratch sheet of paper. So everything off of this was custom fabricated and custom built, and all the ballistic capabilities and ballistic materials are utilized in this. - And I've always wondered, the Secret Service Agents that drive this, do they apply for it? Are they just assigned to each administration? How does that process work? - So the shift agents are a career Special Agent with the Secret Service. And for parts of their career, they get assigned to the president's detail.
They're not assigned to an administration, but they're assigned to the detail. - So what's the training like to be certified to drive this? It must be pretty intense. - So there's a five day advanced course that's called our Protective Operations Driving Course. So any agent that is going to drive the president or the vice president's limo, spare limo, or the follow-up is required to pass our five day course. We actually have the pad available today if you'd like to get strapped in and go for a ride? - I think we gotta do it.
- Let's do it. - Let's do it. (upbeat music) Sam, what we're gonna do here, this is the track that we put all the students on, whether they're basic students or whether they're advanced students going through the Protective Operations Driving Course. And we're gonna do a simulation of driving through a cone course here and we'll do some braking and some sliding, and then it'll simulate some high speed driving, not in the limo, but some high speed driving out here on the course. - Is there anything I need to be prepared for specifically? - Not really. - Just have some fun? - Yeah, we're just gonna have fun.
- Alright, well. - You ready to go? - I'm ready, let's do it. Oh my gosh. - I'm gonna bring it up to speed a little bit down here. - Whoo. - Go towards a cone. - Okay. - Move it across here.
- [Sam] Whoa. Whoa, ****. (tires screeching) Oh my gosh. (upbeat music) - [Instructor #1] We come back up here into another turn. - [Sam] Alright. (tires screeching) - Go around this hook turn.
And then what we'll do here is we teach them how to do a J-turn. Tactically, we don't do J-turns in our big limos. - Okay. - But here's what we do sort of in a J-turn. So I'll set it up here, we'll go backwards here to a certain point, swing it around. - Wow.
(tires screeching) (upbeat music) - And there we have it. - And there we have it. Oh my goodness.
- What'd you think? - I think I might need a second. That was crazy. - Is this something you wanna try? You think you're up to the task? - I don't think I'll be able to do it anywhere close to that, but yeah, let's. - I'd love to put you over here and let you give it a shot.
Let's give it a go. - Let's give it a go. (upbeat music) - Alright, Sam, so now you're in the driver's seat. - I am. - Let's see what we can do, let's go out on the course you saw, the course that I did.
So let's emulate the same course. - Whoo. - Whoo. (upbeat music) Here we go. - Yeah. - Okay. - Move over to the right. - I dunno if I've ever driven this fast.
- Go to to the right. - Which track, this one? - Alright. - Yep, yep. Now turn at the end down here. - Okay. - Break, break, break, turn, turn, turn. Alright, go around this serpentine, so I want you to go through the serpentine. - Okay, zigzag it?
- Yeah, zigzag it. - Alright. - [Instructor #1] All the way through. All the way through.
Yeah, there you go. Now go in between the cones. - Okay. - Then go left.
Now go right in between the cones through the lane changes. Now the lane change, second lane change, third lane. - Whoo. - Into the teardrop. Come all the way down. Straight line break.
Go around this turn, break, break, break, break, break. There you go, now one, two, three, floor. Alright. - Oh my gosh. - Oh, you ready for the J-turn? - You're gonna have to walk me through this one. - Alright. - Okay.
- Tight grip. - Yeah, tight grip, with this hand. - Tight grip. - Yep. - And in one fluid motion, you're gonna go to the eight o'clock position and back. So you go 8:00 and back. 8:00 and back. - 8:00 and back.
Okay, alright, here we go. - Now let's go. (car whirring) Swing it. (upbeat music) - It takes a little bit getting used, but that's fun. - Yeah, it takes a little time to get used to, but it's fun. - Whoo.
Oh my gosh. That was one of the craziest things I've ever done. - Did you enjoy it? - I did enjoy it.
And it just goes to show, the level of skill you guys have to be able to do that. I mean, we're out on a driving pad right now, but you guys are training to do that, should something happen. - We're training to do it to have our agents and our officers to get outta harm's way in a split second's notice. - Well, thank you so much. Thanks for showing me around. - You're welcome. Yeah, fun times. - So much fun.
- Thank you for coming out and sharing the pad with us today. - Thank you so much. - And showing me your skills. - I appreciate that. I've always wanted to film with the Secret Service, and this has just been an amazing opportunity. So appreciate everything you guys do.
- Yep, you're welcome. - [Sam] So there you have it, a behind the scenes look at the headquarters and training grounds of the United States Secret Service. I wanna give a huge shout out to all the men and women who proudly serve within the Secret Service ranks.
And a big thanks to them for allowing me the opportunity to come and take a look inside. If there's one thing I learned, it's that there's a lot more to the Secret Service than just fancy suits and sunglasses. And I hope you gained a newfound appreciation for all that they do. That's it from here in Washington, D.C.
Don't forget to subscribe if you haven't already. And I'll see you in the next one. (suspenseful music)
2024-06-27 09:24
