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The Obama administration is trying to put the case of the White House gate crashers behind it with little success.
From the Washington Post
Case closed.
That’s the verdict the White House has emphatically handed down on the embarrassing and troubling security breach a fame-craving Virginia couple performed during the Obama administration’s first state dinner, on Nov. 24. But eyewitness accounts, a Secret Service criminal investigation, congressional hearings and an Obama administration internal review depict a far more complicated set of circumstances.
A month later, Tareq and Michaele Salahi’s perplexing White House visit has revealed personnel failings and damage control maneuverings in the administration, institutional vulnerabilities in the security agency, and the perils of celebrity culture and political gamesmanship in Washington.
And yet one central part — the participants and the discussion at a dinner planning meeting between representatives from White House social secretary Desirée Rogers’s office and the Secret Service — is being guarded by the administration as a virtual state secret. White House press officers decline to acknowledge the meeting or say who attended or what was said. Rogers declined to comment for this report.
“I’m sure we could find out,” said Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, which has conducted hearings into the security breach.
Except that Thompson — having received the White House’s don’t-go-there message — refuses to find out. The players in that decision contributed to an unlikely chain of events — some comical, some cautionary — in which the exploits of two textbook cases in reality-TV exhibitionism ultimately weakened security around a president whose harm would cause national trauma and international crisis.
Trying for the elite invite
The Salahis say they believe, then as now, they were welcome to attend.
At 12:07 on Nov. 20, a representative of Half Yard Productions, a company shooting footage of the Salahis for a potential Bravo reality show called “The Real Housewives of D.C.,” sent an e-mail to the media affairs office at the White House requesting confirmation that the Salahis had been invited to the state dinner and requesting permission to film the couple at the event, according to a person with knowledge of the Secret Service investigation, who was granted anonymity to discuss details of the inquiry.
The White House acknowledged that the e-mail did not get a reply, “as it was sent to a general inbox for generic press inquiries,” said Nick Shapiro, an administration spokesman. He added that “the Salahis have never produced anything that showed they were invited.”
Later that day, Paul Gardner, a Baltimore-based entertainment lawyer representing the Salahis in their capacity as aspiring reality-TV stars, received an e-mail from his secretary relaying a pressing request from a Pentagon official and friend named Michele S. Jones.
“Michele S. Jones just called regarding the State Dinner at the White House for Tuesday, November 24, 2009,” read the e-mail, explaining that Jones needed to know the couple’s full names, Social Security numbers and citizenships as soon as possible. “This information is very important to be admitted to the White House for anyone.”
According to Thompson, who is familiar with a preliminary Secret Service report about the breach, Gardner knew Jones — a Pentagon official, Facebook friend and former client — and “introduced her” to the Salahis. Thompson’s committee had little interest in Jones, because she was “just a staffer trying to be helpful,” the chairman said. “You see a lot of that in this town.”
The entire episode has been a major embarrassment and distraction to the White House which is struggling to regain the public’s confidence in their ability to govern effectively.
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About the author
Don Irvine is Chairman of Accuracy in Media. He is active on Facebook and Twitter. You can follow him @donirvine to read his latest thoughts.
3 Comments for W.H. Tries to Put Salahi Case Behind It
What’s so secret that the White House doesn’t want the public to know?
The more they try to hide this potato, the more people notice the potato being hidden.
Secrecy and obfuscation are becoming the hallmarks of this administration.
Not good for the country!
There is a photo that was on the Salahi’s facebook
called ROCK THE VOTE 2005 in the photo are
Black eyed peas,Tareq and Michaele Salahi’s and Senator barack Hussien Obama. I have saved the photo for anyone to see even Rep Thompson.
I think I will send it to him,but than I will have to watch my butt.
So these knuckleheads(and their lawyer)still have not provided any proof of their invitation to the WH dinner. OK, that means they broke the law and deserve to be prosecuted. Nah, nevermind, I’ll just turn up the volume to Max on the Prolofeed and increase my dosage of Soma. That should do the trick.