The First Family Detail Read online

  While federal law authorizes the Secret Service to protect the president, president-elect, vice president, and vice president–elect, and their immediate families, the president may extend protection to others, such as top White House aides and the grandchildren of the president or vice president. In the case of Cheney, protection was provided to his two daughters and grandchildren. Including Dick Cheney, that meant nine people got protection. Today Vice President Joe Biden’s five grandchildren are also protected.

  When President Bush extended protection to the Cheney grandchildren, the Secret Service did not add additional agents. Instead, the agency made do by extending hours and paying overtime to agents on the VP’s detail and by borrowing agents from field offices. That allowed no time for the required refresher training, physical fitness tests, and firearms practice.

  “Instead of saying, ‘Well, we’ll be glad to take care of his grandkids, but let’s just do the right thing and get some more people over here so we can cover all these added assignments,’ Secret Service management said to the president, ‘No problem, sir, we’ll take care of it,’ without giving us any more people,” says an agent who was on the vice president’s detail.

  “You end up working twelve-hour days sitting in a cul-de-sac,” says another agent on the detail. “That’s why you don’t get the training, because you’re having to fill in these assignments. You’re fighting battles on a multitude of fronts, because you’ve got the protectees you’re trying to make happy, and you turn around and see people we work for who don’t care about us at all. It leaves you with feelings of hopelessness, and that’s why people want to leave.”

  While Cheney’s daughter Liz treated agents properly when her father was vice president, his daughter Mary was difficult and demanding. Before Mary—code-named Alpine—had a child, the Secret Service provided full protection only to her older sister, Liz, since she had kids. Mary had partial protection: Agents drove her to and from work. But according to agents, Mary seemed to feel competitive.

  “She got all up in arms because we sat outside her sister’s house all night long. She said, ‘Well I think I should have that, too,’ ” an agent says.

  Mary also whined about the Secret Service vehicle assigned to her.

  “She saw that her sister had a brand-new Suburban,” an agent who was on her detail says. “Mary had an older vehicle. She was like, ‘Why can’t I have one?’ Next thing you know, within a day or two, she has a brand-new Suburban from the Secret Service sitting out there in front of her house.”

  When her Suburban sustained some damage, the Secret Service chauffeured her in the older vehicle until the new one could be repaired.

  “When she saw her old vehicle was brought back to use as her limo, she threw a fit,” an agent says. “She called bosses demanding her Suburban be brought back immediately, not realizing that it takes time to make repairs.”

  Mary also objected to agents standing post overnight at the back of her home. They disturbed her dogs, she said.

  “I don’t even know what the back side of her house looks like because she won’t let us walk around the back because of the dogs,” an agent observed when he was on her detail. “Her dogs start barking. It gets them all upset if we go back there. So we’ve got some cameras angled back there. But your hands are tied. It’s a thankless job anyway, but then you’ve got protectees who mandate how you’re going to do your job.”

  When an agent on Mary Cheney’s detail went on vacation, another agent filled in on a temporary basis. Not being aware of what exit she would take, he missed her departure from her office in Washington.

  “She shot an e-mail to a supervisor in our operations section saying that you need to stop putting temps on my shift, I’m getting sick of it, I’m tired of being a tour guide around here,” an agent who was on her detail says. If it happened again, she said, she was going to complain to the special agent in charge of the vice president’s detail.

  When Mary demanded that the Secret Service shuttle her friends out to restaurants, her detail leader refused, as he should have. Secret Service agents are law enforcement officers, not taxi drivers, and they are authorized to protect only specific individuals. But Mary threw a fit and got Secret Service management to remove the leader from her detail. That sent a message to all agents: You do your job and follow the rules, and management may not back you.

  Asked for comment, Mary Cheney said, “These stories are simply not true, and I have nothing but the utmost respect for the men and women of the Secret Service. I am deeply appreciative of everything they have done to keep my family safe.”

  While protecting Dick Cheney, agents were told that a specific, credible threat had been picked up regarding his grandchildren. Normally, one agent was assigned to each grandchild. As a result of the threat information, “agents carrying MP5s doubled up and quadrupled up in cars behind these kids when they were going to the mall and the movies,” an agent says.

  Even though they were known, Secret Service management did not share any details of the threat. The agents had no idea who or what to look out for. Only later did they learn that the threat came from intercepted communications of terrorists in the Middle East.

  “Secret Service senior management in this particular case guarded its own information and prevented the working agents from getting the intelligence they needed to get the job done,” an agent says. “This is my life you’re talking about. If it’s a specific, credible threat against us, against them, that includes me. At least I’ll know what I’m looking for if it comes my way.”

  Dick Cheney had the Secret Service code name Angler, while Lynne Cheney was Author. When assigning code names to protectees, the Secret Service starts with a random list of words, all beginning with the same letter for each family. The code names were once necessary because Secret Service radio transmissions were not encrypted. Now that they are, the Secret Service continues to use code names to avoid confusion when pronouncing the names of protectees. In addition, by using code names, agents prevent people who may overhear a live conversation from recognizing the subject of the conversation.

  Produced by the White House Communications Agency, the list of code names excludes words that are offensive or may be easily mistaken for other words. However, those under protection may object to a code name and propose another. Thus, Lynne Cheney, a prolific author, asked for and was given the Secret Service code name Author. Dick Cheney, an avid fisherman, got the code name Angler.

  George W. Bush objected to Tumbler, the code name he was initially assigned. Perhaps it reminded him of his drinking days. Instead, he chose Trailblazer. Bush’s chief of staff Josh Bolton chose Fatboy, referring to the Fat Boy model of his silver-and-black Harley-Davidson. His predecessor, Andy Card, was Patriot, a code name the Secret Service chose when Card said he did not like his assigned name Potomac.

  With two exceptions, agents had no problems with the rest of the Bush administration. The exceptions were Treasury Secretary John Snow and Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge. Ridge was incredibly cheap. On weekends, he would return to his home in Erie, Pennsylvania, and so that he would not have to pay for his own plane ticket, he would insist that agents drive him. The trip from Washington was more than six hours.

  “The guy would make them motorcade to Erie, Pennsylvania, almost every other weekend, or every weekend, because he didn’t want to pay for a plane ticket,” an agent who was on his detail says. “If the guy found a free meal, he was there. His reputation in the service was he was the biggest cheapskate ever.”

  Instead of buying a newspaper at hotels, Ridge would ask agents for their copy of the paper.

  “If somebody said, ‘Hey, Mr. Secretary, appreciate it, meal’s on us,’ Ridge would go back there the next night to the same restaurant and see how long he could milk a free meal from this place,” an agent says.

  Agents liked John Snow because he loved to chat and joke with them.

  “John Snow was kind of a pretty cool protecte
e, in that he knew every guy on the detail,” an agent says. “He’d sit in the back of his limo, and he’d talk with you. It was like a group of guys hanging out.”

  But Snow, a former chairman and chief executive officer of CSX Corporation, had what agents on his detail believed was a mistress in Richmond, where he and his wife had lived. While Snow rented and later bought an apartment in Washington, he would travel back to his hometown almost every weekend. That incurred huge expenses for taxpayers because agents had to drive him the two hours to Richmond and stay in hotels there.

  The Secret Service gave the woman the unofficial code name Area 51, after the supersecret Air Force testing ground in Nevada that gives rise to conspiracy theories.

  Now chairman of Cerberus Capital Management, Snow commented through his Richmond lawyer Richard Cullen, a former Virginia state attorney general and personal friend of the Snows for more than twenty-five years.

  “John Snow did not have an affair,” Cullen said. “The agents who refuse to identify themselves in making this accusation are simply and sadly very wrong.”

  But agents who were on Snow’s detail say otherwise. Snow “was messing around quite a bit, and it was pretty disturbing to the guys on the detail, because we knew we were away from home for the express purpose of him to meet up with his mistress,” says a former agent who was on his detail.

  One morning, an agent was walking by the front window of Snow’s house in Richmond and saw Snow and the alleged mistress kissing. At another point, the woman’s husband came home while Snow was seeing her in the couple’s home. An agent banged the doors of his Suburban and called out the husband’s name to try to alert Snow. As the husband was walking into his house, Snow came out, his hair messed up.

  The woman would also fly to Washington and see Snow at his rented apartment.

  “She knew all of us by name,” a former agent says. “She’d just come out of the woodwork out of nowhere and say, ‘Hey guys!’ We’d go on hikes, and she’d be there. She was always around.”

  What infuriated agents is that Snow seemed to think he was successfully pulling the wool over their eyes.

  In commenting, Cullen said neither Snow nor his family “improperly used the services of the U.S. Secret Service detail assigned to him. The Secret Service is required to protect the secretary of the treasury,” Cullen said. “Protection is mandatory. It is not discretionary. Nor is it assigned on the basis of a threat assessment for a particular event or trip.”

  Snow considers Secret Service agents “professional, brave, and extremely hardworking,” Cullen said. While Snow is “surprised and saddened that a former Secret Service agent would be a source of any information—particularly anonymous, erroneous information—going into a book, he believes that the honor and historic tradition of the Secret Service will remain intact, and he recalls with great fondness and affection the brave members of his detail.” In view of that, Cullen said, Snow is “surprised that you would imply in your book that he had asked or demanded that his detail ever deviate from their proper role.”

  In fact, while Snow’s lawyer is correct in saying that the treasury secretary, along with others in the line of succession to the presidency, is required to have Secret Service protection when the secretary of homeland security authorizes it, he is wrong in saying that this book suggests that Snow asked that his detail deviate from their proper role.

  The Secret Service is required to provide protection when a government official such as Snow chooses to travel from Washington every weekend, whether to see his mistress, his wife, or a play. The question is whether government officials should be taking such frequent personal trips when American taxpayers are footing the bill.

  24

  EXPOSING ROMNEY TO DANGER

  Deciding when to protect a presidential candidate is a cat-and-mouse game. Some candidates want protection simply because it gives them more credibility as a contender and makes their lives easier. Others shun protection even when they become viable candidates and have received threats.

  By law, the Secret Service provides protection of major presidential and vice presidential candidates and their spouses. The secretary of homeland security determines who the major candidates are after consulting with an advisory committee consisting of the speaker and minority leader of the House and the majority and minority leaders of the Senate, who select one additional member.

  The secretary of homeland security decides when to initiate protection. Protection of spouses starts 120 days before the general election, unless the DHS or an executive order authorizes it sooner. To protect a presidential candidate, the Secret Service spends an extra $38,000 a day beyond agents’ regular salaries. That includes airline tickets for agents and for advance personnel, rental cars, meals, and overtime.

  Especially during campaigns, the Secret Service’s dual roles of providing protection and investigating financial crimes complement each other. Agents pursuing financial crimes gain investigative experience and forge partnerships with local law enforcement. That comes in handy when agents engage in protection. At the same time, when presidential campaigns begin, the agency can pull agents from investigating financial crimes to protect candidates. In man-hours, slightly more than half of agents’ time is devoted to protection.

  While Barack Obama never received a specific threat before his protection started on May 3, 2007, agents on the Secret Service’s Internet Threat Desk homed in on a number of vaguely threatening and nasty comments, mostly directed at the fact that he is African-American.

  In the end, according to Steven Hughes, who was then deputy special agent in charge of the Dignitary Protection Division, “we really picked him up because he asked for the protection, and then it goes through a whole process of whether we will protect him or not, and it’s really not driven by the Secret Service. It’s something that he asked for, and the secretary of homeland security and the president ultimately said he is a viable candidate, and it’s a go for protection.”

  Mitt Romney began receiving Secret Service protection on the evening of February 1, 2012. For four months before that, Romney paid for his own private protection from U.S. Safety and Security, headed by former Secret Service agent Joseph Funk.

  As with any candidate, top Secret Service officials met with Mitt and Ann Romney to discuss protection. By then, Romney was receiving about one threat a day, mainly by letter or phone. In fact, a day before the Secret Service picked up protection, as Romney walked to the stage inside a warehouse in Eagan, Minnesota, a gay rights activist who said he represented the group Glitterati and Occupy Minneapolis threw a cup of glitter on Romney. The glitter poured over Romney’s hair, stuck to his face, and shimmered from his navy blazer. Local police escorted the man out.

  A week after Secret Service protection began, Peter Smith, a twenty-year-old college student, tossed a handful of blue glitter at Romney as the former Massachusetts governor was shaking hands with supporters in Denver. At the time, Smith was interning for the Democratic-controlled state senate in Colorado. He was fired after the incident and later pleaded guilty to a charge of disturbing the peace.

  “We made the request to ask them to provide protection,” says a high-ranking Romney campaign staffer. “We were not eager to get it. Mitt had the financial means to provide his own security. We also understood the drawbacks of Secret Service protection. We felt it created a distance between a candidate and the voters that we were not eager to have. But there were threats almost daily, and our security company said it was getting to the point where they could not guarantee his safety.”

  The fifteen Secret Service agents on Romney’s detail found that the Romneys treated them like family. Although the agents usually declined, the Romneys invited them to lunch and dinner. Romney would kibitz with them and with the additional agents on Ann’s detail. When a female agent brought her young son to a debate at Hofstra University, Romney took him aside and discussed government and politics with him.

  On August 29, 2012, a fe
male agent accidentally left her gun in the bathroom of Romney’s campaign plane on a flight from Florida to Indiana. An Associated Press reporter discovered the weapon and decided to write about the incident. As a result, the Secret Service removed the agent, who had been assigned to act as liaison with the press corps, from the campaign. Romney and his aides were distressed.

  “The gun was left unattended accidentally for it sounds like less than a minute, and the AP found it,” a Romney aide says. “This woman was the dedicated press agent, so this woman lives with the press and spent all day every day helping them and giving them updates. A few reporters repaid her kindness and flexibility by having a meeting, and they decided that since two or three of the press corps couldn’t seem to leave it alone, and they didn’t want to get scooped on this non-story, several of them would write it. So the woman was transferred off of her post because of her mistake. Governor Romney was on her side and requested that she not be moved out.”

  In fact, Romney made the request personally to Director Mark Sullivan. But the Secret Service has a policy of not acceding to such personal requests by protectees, because allowing protectees to intervene in personnel matters would tend to undermine management and possibly weaken protection.

  On election night, when Romney called Obama from his suite at the Westin Waterfront Hotel in Boston to concede that the president had won, “one of the agents was in tears,” a Romney campaign aide recalls. “He was so sad that he lost. The agents became part of the family.”

  The next morning, before the agents departed, Ann Romney made buttermilk pancakes, which Mitt served them on paper plates in their vehicles outside the Romneys’ townhome in Belmont, Massachusetts.