Former Secret Service agent Dan Bongino has seen the dirty side of politics.
Bongino, the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate in Maryland, spent twelve years in the Secret Service in the New York field office, four of which he spent in the Presidential Protection commission, first under former President George W. Bush and then under current President Barack Obama.
He was also the lead agent responsible for coordinating Obama’s trip to Prague for the signing of the START treaty, his visit to Jakarta, Indonesia and his visit to an active war zone in Afghanistan.
Now, Bongino is running for Congress in hopes of changing the system.
“You get to see the sausage being made,” Bongino quipped in a phone interview. “It’s not always a pretty sight.”
It was Bongino’s time serving in the police force and as a member of the Secret Service that persuaded him to run for office. He said the system is not only broken but smashed to pieces, and the corruption is clearly visible when you have the chance to experience the behind-the-scenes version of the Presidency and high government.
Bongino said he decided to run out of a, “sense of personal obligation.”
“I see this fight as the most important of our lifetime,” he said. “Real people need to take on these challenges and shake up this atrocious system.”
The main problem, he said, is that high government office is treated as the most exclusive club in the world. He said they have lost the Founding Fathers’ original intention of having common Americans run the government.
“It was meant to be inclusive,” he said.
And for Bongino, normalcy and commonness is the most important thing he can bring to the Senate floor.
“I am not bought and sold by anyone,” he said. “I am the only true outsider in this campaign and the only one that can shake up this rotten mess of insulated bureaucracy.”
Although Bongino’s chances of winning are incredibly slim, he has become a conservative favorite this year in the race to take back the U.S. Senate. His straight-forward approach to government reform has garnered him endorsements from 2008 vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, Utah Sen. Mike Lee, Tea Party organization FreedomWorks and most recently former Pennsylvania Governor and the first-ever U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge.
Bongino says the toughest part of his campaign has been trying to compete against with the spending of his Democratic opponent, incumbent Sen. Ben Cardin.
“Overcoming money disadvantages is a headache,” he said, noting that he was fighting against a multi-millionaire.
But Bongino remains optimistic about the future of his campaign and the future of America.
“This is America, we can fix anything,” he said. His only hope is that America will vote well in November in order to change course now and keep America from having to fix problems that should be avoided in the first place.
In a more Republican state than Maryland Bongino would run away with the race despite his money woes. But even if Bongino is unsuccessful in this election, he is sure to become a conservative super star.
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