WASHINGTON: US lawmakers scolded the head of the US Secret Service yesterday over a security breach that allowed a knife-wielding intruder to run deep into the White House, and Director Julia Pierson promised to make changes to agency procedures to ensure it would never happen again.
“This is unacceptable and I take full responsibility,” Pierson told a US House of Representatives committee investigating the September 19 incident in which an intruder jumped the fence, burst through the front door and ran into the East Room of the White House.
“It is clear that our security plan was not executed properly,” she said, promising a complete review of procedures. She also said Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson had requested an investigation.
The incident is the latest black mark for the elite agency charged with protecting the president, which has suffered a series of scandals including a lone gunman firing shots at the White House in 2011, a prostitution scandal involving agents in Colombia in 2012 and a night of drinking in March that led to three agents being sent home from a presidential trip to Amsterdam.
Lawmakers from both parties said the incident had damaged the agency’s reputation and punctured the image of invulnerability that helps protect President Barack Obama. “The White House is supposed to be one of America’s most secure facilities,” said Republican Committee Chairman Darrell Issa. “How on earth did this happen?”
Issa said there was no guard posted at the front door of the White House that evening and that fence-jumper Omar Gonzalez, a 42-year-old Iraq war veteran, breached five rings of security.
Another Republican, U.S. Representative Jason Chaffetz, chided Pierson for the agency’s statement that officers exercised “tremendous restraint.” “Tremendous restraint is not what we’re looking for,” he said. “The message should be overwhelming force.
“Don’t let somebody get close to the president, don’t let somebody get close to his family, don’t let them get into the White House. Ever. And if they have to take action that’s lethal, I will have their back,” he said.
Pierson did not provide details of the breach in her prepared testimony, deferring some issues to a closed classified session with committee members to follow.
Reuters
