The Senate hearing with the acting Secret Service director regarding the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump was extremely tense, to say the least. 

According to the BBC, "shouting matches" erupted as senators grilled acting director of the Secret Service Donald Rowe Jr. over the security failures that led to Trump nearly losing his life by an assassin's bullet.

Rowe was especially scrutinized by GOP senators over the lack of firings in the wake of the shooting.

Sens. Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) both sparred with Rowe while he attempted to defend the agency, though he admitted there were plenty of failures.

What happened?

Hawley held nothing back as he questioned the acting director, demanding to know how a former president was nearly killed at an outdoor rally in Pennsylvania. He also demanded that agents be fired as a result.

"Isn’t the fact that a former president was shot, that a good American is dead, that other Americans were critically wounded — isn’t that enough mission failure for you to say that the person who decided that building should not be in the security perimeter probably ought to be stepped down?" Hawley asked.

Rowe repeatedly attempted to dodge giving information about specific agents, noting that an internal investigation was still underway.

"I want to be neutral and make sure that we get to the bottom of it and interview everybody in order to determine if there was more than one person who perhaps exercised bad judgment," Rowe said.

Hawley dug in, noting that Rowe has been the acting director for several days and still hasn't fired anyone, sparking an emotional reply.

"I have lost sleep over that for the last 17 days, just like you have, and I will tell you, senator, that I will not rush to judgment, that people will be held accountable, and I will do so with integrity and not rush to judgment and put people [out there to be] unfairly persecuted," Rowe said.

"Unfairly persecuted?" Hawley snapped back. "We’ve got people who are dead."

Cruz up to bat

Cruz dug in on attempting to find out who was in charge of setting up Trump's security detail for that particular rally in Pennsylvania, demanding names.

At one point during the heated exchange, Cruz shouted at Rowe to stop interrupting him.

The heated hearing is likely one of many investigative tools as many in Congress work to get to the bottom of the events that nearly led to Trump's death in front of thousands of people.