Youngest Secret Service agent DJ Daniel tragically diagnosed with ‘three new tumors’
“We’re just going around showing people, hey, you do care for one another. Let’s give compassion and let’s try to join and help each other get through things.”
May 31, 2025 minute read
The teenage brain cancer survivor whom President Donald Trump made into an honorary Secret Service agent has tragically been diagnosed with having “three new tumors.”
The father of Devarjaye “DJ” Daniel—the teen Trump honored during a joint Congressional address earlier this year and was told in 2018 that he had only five months to live—has revealed that his son’s battle with the illness is not over, and said that the family is “just winging it day by day. He does have three new tumors.”
“It’s rough, there isn’t a class that can teach you how to deal with it. You’re hearing that your child has a nasty disease,” DJ’s father, Theodis Daniel, told Fox 7. “We’re just going around showing people, hey, you do care for one another. Let’s give compassion and let’s try to join and help each other get through things.”
DJ’s dream has been to become a police officer, and that was highlighted by Trump during his address to Congress.
“Joining us in the gallery tonight is a young man who truly loves our police. His name is DJ Daniel. He is 13 years old. And he has always dreamed of becoming a police officer himself. But in 2018, DJ was diagnosed with brain cancer. The doctors gave him five months at most to live. That was more than six years ago. Since that time, DJ and his dad have been on a quest to make his dream come true. And DJ has been sworn in as an honorary law enforcement officer,” Trump said at the time.
DJ has become an honorary police officer at several departments and has been able to be sworn in at 1,351 law enforcement agencies across the country, pushing past his goal of 1,000.
His father said that the family has used an experimental medicine that is being used in a study to treat his son.
Despite the illness, DJ’s father says he maintains good spirits, “Look at him, he’s happy, vibrant. I never know what’s going to come out of his mouth. It makes me nervous half the time, because he has jokes,” his father commented, mentioning that his son will sometimes rub his head, saying that it has good luck.
