If Trump loses the election and flees to another country to avoid his sentencing in his (multiple) lawsuits, does the Secret Service have to go with him?

grasshopper_mouse@lemmy.world to No Stupid Questions@lemmy.world – 372 points –

Former U.S. presidents are authorized a security detail from the Secret Service for life. If Trump loses the election and flees the country, does his security detail have to go with him if he requests it?

I imagine this could go down in a variety of ways: He departs the U.S. before he's sentenced and just never returns, or he attempts to flees or does flees the U.S. after his sentencing. Either way, what happens to his security detail?

If he attempts to flees after he's sentenced, I would hope the detail would refuse to take part in it (if he can even board a plane/leave the country to begin with), but given all their failings, who knows.

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USSS won't just let him get on a plane and fly off to Russia. His security is their top priority, so allowing him to secrete himself somewhere without first verifying his itinerary and securing both the mode of transportation and the destination, would be unthinkable. That means they are reporting all of his movements to local law enforcement. Can't exactly flee the country in secret when every cop in the state will know his exact position and have eyes on him at all times. If the courts think he is a flight risk, someone involved in the process will know what he's trying to do and prevent him from going anywhere where it will be hard to get him back again.

I didn't know that Secret Service was mandatory for former US Presidents.

I suppose he could dismiss them, but considering he just had two recent attempts on his life, that would probably be unwise to say the least.

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