'Outrageous and an Insult': NY Times Publishes Trump Assassination Story

The US Secret Service is blasting The New York Times for publishing a fictional short story of President Trump being assassinated by a Russian agent with a pistol that belonged to one of his own agents in his security detail.

In the story, the agent pulls his gun when he gets close to the president.  He pulls the trigger, only to have the gun misfire. Expecting to be killed, the agent is astonished when a secret service agent on Trump's protection detail hands him his own weapon to kill the president.

The Times defended the story titled "How it Ends," by Zoe Sharp as a "work of fiction," but the Secret Service didn't find the story entertaining, to say the least. 

"While we understand this is a work of fiction, the insinuation that the U.S. Secret Service would participate in the assassination of a President is outrageous and an insult to the men and women of this agency. The U.S. Secret Service prides itself on being an apolitical agency with a long and distinguished history of protecting our nation's elected officials," a Secret Service spokesperson told Fox News.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders also called the story "absolutely abhorrent and disgraceful" during an appearance on "Fox & Friends."

Media Research Center analyst Clay Waters slammed the story as "disgusting" and labeled it "a Trump assassination fantasy."

"It's very clear what this is: a work of fiction, commissioned by editors of the Book Review as part of a package of five stories penned by a range of spy and crime novelists – in the Halloween edition," a spokesperson for the newspaper told Fox News. 

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise said the newspaper should take down and apologize for a short story about assassinating President Donald Trump.

"The media needs to take accountability for the role they are playing in promoting dangerous rhetoric and division in this country, particularly against President Trump and his supporters," Scalise (R-LA) said in a statement to The Daily Caller News Foundation. "The decision by The New York Times to run this piece is irresponsible and offensive, and they should remove it and apologize."