One of the most important – but overlooked – professions in U.S. history is a Secret Service agent assigned with presidential protection duty. That’s because failure can change the course of history, as it did on 11/22/63.
Protection for candidates changed and evolved from the free-wheeling style of the 1950s and early 1960s, which afforded presidential candidates little or no protection, to the growth of bodyguard personnel, increased intelligence facilities and state of the art technology employed today to keep the candidates safe. Presidential candidates relish connecting with the public and it has given greater visibility to the bodyguards who are willing to place themselves between a presidential candidate and a would-be attacker.

In the milieu in which the Secret Service operates, bodyguards have witnessed the terrors of election campaigns when presidential candidates have waded into crowds to shake hands with their supporters, rode in open-top cars, and made sudden but risky changes to their schedules – oblivious to the fact that in every campaign there have been people stalking candidates with ill intent.

Today’s guest, Mel Ayton, author of Protecting the Presidential Candidates looks at these stories, from JFK to Joe Biden. We discuss the personal as well as professional relationships between the candidate and the bodyguards who protected them. Some candidates were so trusting of their bodyguards they embraced them as part of an ‘inner circle’ of advisers.

Bodyguards have also witnessed embarrassing moments in a candidate’s campaign and how intrusive they have been at the most delicate of moments. "The president’s day is your day," one agent said. "Nobody sees the president the way an agent does."

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.