WASHINGTON — The Secret Service chief has stepped-up security outside the White House after a man with a knife who jumped the fence made it into the presidential residence before being apprehended, officials said Saturday.
President Barack Obama insisted he still has confidence in the beleaguered agency’s ability to protect him and his family.
Uniformed Secret Service officers walk along the lawn on the North side of the White House in Washington, Saturday, Sept. 20, 2014. The Secret Service is coming under renewed scrutiny after a man scaled the White House fence and made it all the way through the front door before he was apprehended. AP
Director Julia Pierson ordered enhanced officer patrols and surveillance along the North Fence of the compound just after the incident on Friday evening, which triggered a rare evacuation of the White House as well as renewed scrutiny about the agency’s ability to protect the president and his family. The Secret Service said Pierson had also ordered a comprehensive review of what happened.
“The president has full confidence in the Secret Service and is grateful to the men and women who day in and day out protect himself, his family and the White House,” said White House spokesman Frank Benenati. He said the White House expected Pierson’s review to be conducted “with the same professionalism and commitment to duty that we and the American people expect from the U.S. Secret Service.”
The presidential vote of confidence came as the storied agency sought to dispel growing concerns about security at the White House, one of the most heavily protected buildings in the world.
President Barack Obama and his daughters had just left the White House by helicopter on Friday evening when the Secret Service says 42-year-old Omar J. Gonzalez scaled the fence, darting across the lawn and through the North Portico doors before officers finally tackled him.
“Every day the Secret Service is challenged to ensure security at the White House complex while still allowing public accessibility to a national historical site,” the agency said in a statement. “Although last night the officers showed tremendous restraint and discipline in dealing with this subject, the location of Gonzalez’s arrest is not acceptable.”
Less than 24 hours after Gonzalez’ arrest, a second man was apprehended after he drove up to a White House gate and refused to leave, the Secret Service said, prompting bomb technicians in full gear to search the vehicle as agents shut down nearby streets.
There were no indications the two events were related. Yet the pair of incidents in short succession only intensified the scrutiny of the Secret Service, which is still struggling to rehabilitate its image following a series of allegations of misconduct by agents in recent years, including agents on Obama’s detail.
Gonzalez, of Texas, was charged Friday with unlawful entry into the White House complex and transported to a nearby hospital complaining of chest pain.
Sgt. 1st Class David Haslach, who lives two doors down from Gonzalez’s former Texas home, said Gonzalez had been in the U.S. military and told Haslach he had received a medical discharge. He and another former neighbor, Elke Warner, both recalled him seeming paranoid in the months before he left town.
“At the end, he got so weird. He had motion detector lights put in,” Warner said. She added that she last saw Gonzalez about a year and a half ago at a nearby camp site, where he was apparently living with his two dogs.
Attempts to reach Gonzales or his relatives by phone were unsuccessful.