What is the main message of Zero Fail?

Zero Fail sheds light on the challenges and controversies faced by the Secret Service, highlighting the importance of their role in protecting the nation.

How long does it take to read Zero Fail?

The reading time for Zero Fail varies depending on the reader's speed, but it typically takes several hours. However, the Blinkist summary can be read in just 15 minutes.

Is Zero Fail a good book? Is it worth reading?

Zero Fail is worth reading for its insightful exploration of the Secret Service and its impact on American history. It offers a nuanced perspective on the challenges and successes of an essential agency.

Who is the author of Zero Fail?

Carol Leonnig is the author of Zero Fail.

Zero Fail Summary of Key Ideas and Review

Name: Zero Fail
Rating: 4.1 (43 reviews)
Author: Carol Leonnig

Introduction

What’s in it for me? A shocking account of ineptitude and immaturity on the part of agents sworn to protect the president.

You’ve seen them. Those guys behind the president, with wires in their ears and bulldog expressions on their faces. They look like nonplussed linebackers in cheap suits. Many times, they’ve been the only ones between a bullet and the leader of the free world. But many other times, they’ve been engaged in much less noble pursuits: getting fall-down inebriated on assignment, shortchanging sex workers in foreign countries, or drunk-driving government vehicles across Washington, D.C. In these blinks, you’ll get all the gory details of the Secret Service, from its chaotic early days, to the escapade that made a famously cool Barack Obama lose his temper.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

why agents were hungover the day Kennedy was assassinated;
how close two women came to killing Gerald Ford in the same month; and
which First Lady is the least popular on record.

Key idea 1 of 8

The haphazard way in which the Secret Service was created set the tone for the years to come.

When President William McKinley was killed at a campaign rally in 1901, he became the third US president to be assassinated in 36 years. Congress was both shocked and humiliated – shocked at how easy it had been to take down the president, and humiliated by how frequent these assassinations were becoming. Casting about for a solution, they turned to the Secret Service, an organization set up decades earlier to rein in the out-of-control counterfeiting industry. Protecting the president was now part of its remit, but the Service had no cohesive strategy for the new job.

The key message here is: The chaos around the Kennedy assassination reflects the Secret Service’s haphazard founding.

For more than half a century, it seemed that the Secret Service was coping just fine. And then Kennedy came to power. He was a new breed of president. He was rock-star popular; he drew massive crowds wherever he went; he was up close and personal. But not everyone was a fan. In Kennedy’s first six weeks in office, the White House received three times the average number of threats.

Kennedy’s divisive personality, and his constant public exposure, called for a new kind of protection – one that the Secret Service could not provide. So its officers began to cut corners. They worked double shifts, they racked up overtime, they were exhausted and on edge.

In the fall of 1963, Kennedy was on the campaign trail. This was his busiest week since entering the White House. Of course, the Secret Service followed him everywhere he went. On November 21, in Ft. Worth, Texas, some off-duty agents decided to blow off steam at a local bar. Drinking was against regulation, but few cared. It was a late night: some agents didn’t get back to the hotel until 5:00 am.

The next morning, many of them were on only a few hours sleep – and almost all were nursing hangovers. As Kennedy’s motorcade crawled through Dallas, there was an explosive crack. Instead of speeding away, the driver slowed down. Agents raced toward the president’s car, and then another shot rang out. This second bullet hit Kennedy in the head. An hour later, the president was pronounced dead.

Nothing like this had happened in America for decades. The Secret Service failed in its main responsibility, its only job. For years, guilt troubled many of its agents. They dissected that day – and the night before it – minute by minute. This was a failure of historic proportions.

But, as we’ll learn in the next blink, the Secret Service’s troubles were only just beginning.

Key idea 2 of 8

Nixon’s paranoia created division in the Service, even as they foiled attempted assassinations.

The Nixon years were tough on the Service. The constantly-conniving president repeatedly tried to use its agents to gather dirt on his opponents, especially the hated Kennedys. After Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in 1968, Nixon tried to force the last surviving Kennedy brother, Teddy, to take on Secret Service protection. Nixon’s idea was essentially to put Teddy under surveillance by assigning him hand-selected agents loyal to the White House. But Kennedy demurred, and Nixon was forced to abandon the plan.

The Nixon years had divided the Service’s ranks. His scheming created an inner circle of agents: people who thought pleasing the president was more important than keeping him safe. They treated outsiders with scorn and derision.

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Key idea 3 of 8

After saving President Reagan from an attack that nearly cost him his life, the Service became even more divided.

In March 1981, newly inaugurated President Ronald Reagan was set to deliver a speech to a labor union at a Washington hotel. It was a routine, low-risk event, so Jerry Parr, who led the Secret Service detail that day, decided the president did not need to wear a bulletproof vest.

After Reagan finished his speech, he was heading back to his car. The president was six feet from the open door, waving to his supporters, when John Hinckley Jr. crouched into a combat position, took aim, and pulled the trigger. Five shots rang out in just two seconds. Parr, the Secret Service man, didn’t have time to think. He threw himself between the president and the gunman, pushed Reagan into the car, and yelled at the driver to “Get out of here, go go go!”

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Key idea 4 of 8

Clinton’s voracious appetite for extramarital dalliances tested the Service as never before.

Even before he moved into the White House, Bill Clinton had a reputation as a womanizer. Throughout his campaign and presidency, Secret Service agents got an exclusive look into Clinton’s personal life – enough to confirm that the rumors were true.

When Clinton was a candidate, agents would run with him on his morning jog to the YMCA, and then accompany him home after the workout. After a while, one agent wondered why they didn’t send anybody into the gym with him. “Let it go,” his supervisor said.

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Key idea 5 of 8

As the world changed around it, the Service sank ever deeper into scandal.

President George W. Bush’s trip to Sarasota, Florida in the fall of 2001 was expected to be pretty low-key. The purpose was to promote the new education bill, so on the morning of September 11, the president was scheduled to visit an elementary school.

“This should be an easy day,” Bush’s chief of staff told him. As we now know, things turned out differently.

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Key idea 6 of 8

The Service reached its nadir with the scandal that became known as Hookergate

The agents assigned to Obama’s detail on a trip to Cartagena, Colombia, in April 2012, felt like they’d won the lottery. It was a plum assignment, with plenty of time for partying before the president arrived. “Our motto for this trip is Una Mas Cerveza por favor,” a supervisor wrote in an email to his team before departing. For the non-Spanish speakers, that’s “Could I have another beer, please?”

On the night of April 11, agents went out on the town. They caroused in nightclubs, and many ended up hiring sex workers – a legal activity in Cartagena – to accompany them back to their hotels. In the morning, though, there was a dispute between an agent and a sex worker about payment. By the time local police got involved, the quarrel was escalating into an international incident. It came to be known as Hookergate.

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Key idea 7 of 8

The Obama years ushered in a new era of ineptitude and recklessness for the Service.

Julia Pierson promised Obama that she would put a stop to the louche ways of agents on the road. But even her strict approach to professional discipline couldn’t keep agents on the straight and narrow.

In March 2014, two agents crashed their SUV in the Florida Keys after drinking so many tequila shots that one of them threw up. Pierson found herself in the uncomfortable position of having to explain their embarrassing behavior to her boss.

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Key idea 8 of 8

Trump’s chaotic presidency exacerbated the woes of a foundering Secret Service.

When Donald Trump became President in 2016, many agents were delighted. They certainly didn’t want Hillary Clinton to win: lots of people in the Secret Service still hated Clinton from her days as First Lady. And it wasn’t just about her, personally: as we’ve already seen, the agency was full of cops generally dismissive toward women.

They thought Trump would be much better news. Many field agents openly kept “Make America Great Again” hats on their desks. They also frequently swapped sexist, crude memes about Mrs. Clinton.

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