Secret Service: Drone Swarms Remain an Unsolved Threat
The U.S. Secret Service has publicly acknowledged that hostile drone swarms remain a security problem it has not solved, even as the agency invests millions in new counter-drone technology and confronts a surge in threats against the people it protects.
“Swarms are a huge problem and a big threat,” Deputy Director Matthew Quinn said in an interview with CBS News that aired on 60 Minutes on October 11, 2026. “I’d love to tell you the swarm problem is solved. It’s not.”
The admission reflects a broader challenge for the agency: threats to presidents, dignitaries, and other protectees have grown more varied, more numerous, and harder to anticipate. Secret Service Director Sean Curran said the current environment is the most difficult he has seen in his 24-year career.
“The numbers at this agency, and certainly I’ve never seen in my 24-year career, they’re off the charts,” Curran told reporters during a July 22 briefing, according to ABC News. “The threat picture and environment is as large as I’ve ever seen it.”
A Surge in Threats
The agency has handled roughly 10,000 threat-related cases against protectees in 2026 — a 40% increase over the same period last year. Officials told reporters that the rise is driven in part by the internet’s role in radicalization and by a sharp uptick in mental-health crises.
The Secret Service reported nearly ten times as many mental-health-related interventions as the previous year, including voluntary and involuntary commitments and cooperation with relatives and healthcare providers to stabilize people in crisis.
“I think a lot of it has to do with the internet,” Curran told CBS News. “People are more accessible. Information is more accessible.”
Quinn pointed to a different factor. “I think the biggest factor we’re dealing with today is mental health issues for sure,” he said. “More people are being pushed over the edge in either direction.”
Beyond domestic threats, the agency is also contending with foreign adversaries. Iranian leaders have publicly vowed revenge against the United States, and Quinn acknowledged the elevated threat environment in remarks reported by ABC News. “I don’t think it’s any secret, it’s been in the media, that Iran has publicly said they want to kill President Trump,” he said.
The Drone Problem in Focus
Quinn now leads a multimillion-dollar program to develop offensive and defensive drone capabilities. Among the agency’s newest tools is an artificial intelligence and radar-guided “drone hunter” that disables enemy drones and captures them with a net.
The agency has studied the war in Ukraine closely as a proving ground for low-cost, weaponized drones. “We know that technology is going to hit the homeland at some point,” Quinn told CBS News. “So we’re using lessons learned there to build our program and make sure we’re ahead of it before it gets here.”
The concern is not hypothetical. According to a Baltimore Sun report published by Officer.com on October 13, the Secret Service used electronic jamming equipment to take down a drone during the December 2025 Army-Navy Game in Baltimore, where President Trump, Maryland Governor Wes Moore, and members of Congress were present. A temporary flight restriction had been in place over M&T Bank Stadium, barring drones within a two-nautical-mile radius and up to 2,000 feet.
The Secret Service declined to answer questions about when and where the drone was detected, whether officials considered it a threat, or whether state officials were notified.
The Army-Navy episode is not an isolated incident in Baltimore. Drones interrupted Ravens games in 2023, 2024, and during a January 2025 playoff game that forced a brief suspension of play and prompted a federal criminal case.
An Agency in Transition
The drone challenge comes as the Secret Service continues to reckon with its most serious failure in decades: the July 13, 2024, assassination attempt on Trump at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. A June 2026 report from the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General found the agency “missed multiple opportunities to detect, prevent, and disrupt the assassination attempt.”
Then-Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned in the aftermath. Curran, who was the lead agent protecting Trump that day, was later appointed director during Trump’s second term.
The agency has since expanded training and added resources at protected events, including a medical response truck equipped with a trauma unit and field surgeon, and a new armored personnel carrier in the presidential motorcade.
Staffing remains a concern. A Homeland Security Inspector General report found that the counter-sniper team is staffed 73% below the level needed to protect senior leaders. Quinn said there are now 942 people in training, compared with “maybe 200” the previous year.
A Fractious Policy Debate
The drone threat has also become a state-level political issue. Maryland lawmakers have debated how much authority state and local agencies should have to counter unauthorized drones, and how to regulate their own use.
Legislation introduced by Republican Delegate Robin Grammer of Baltimore County in 2025 and 2026 focused on limiting government surveillance drones rather than on the authority to disable hostile ones. Neither bill became law. The Maryland Chiefs of Police Association and Maryland Sheriffs’ Association opposed the 2026 measure, arguing it could hinder investigations and emergency response. Maryland House Minority Leader Jason Buckel, who attended the Army-Navy game, has called for shared state and federal control over drone mitigation.
At the federal level, the “Safer Skies Act” enables state and local agencies to access drone-mitigation tools after specialized FBI training.
What’s Next
The Secret Service has also taken extraordinary steps to protect the president from foreign threats, including an incident in July 2026 in which Trump was secretly moved to a different aircraft while leaving Turkey after intelligence reports of an Iranian plot to fire a missile at Air Force One. Staff, press, and agents remained on the decoy plane. Curran confirmed the tactic and expressed frustration that it had become public.
“That’s not the first time we’ve done that,” Curran told CBS News. “We wish that wasn’t reported, because that takes some of our tactics away from being able to do something similar again.”
As the agency prepares for the rescheduled White House Correspondents’ Dinner and the looming midterm elections, its leaders say the fundamental mission has not changed — only the range of hazards they must plan for.
“We have to assume that it’s possible,” Curran said of the threats. “The second we’re not, we’re going to get caught flat-footed.”