Senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett seems to have Secret Service protection, Keith Koffler writes on his blog “
White House Dossier.” It’s the first time the veteran White House correspondent has heard of someone at that level receiving the expensive assistance of Secret Service agents.
A local report said at least two agents were with Jarrett during her appearance at an Atlanta church Sunday ahead of Martin Luther King Day. She used the speech to attack Republicans.
A Koffler source said he saw Jarrett with at least two Secret Service agents at Reagan National Airport just before Christmas. One agent was in front of her at the security line, another was behind her, and there may have been a third at her side, the source told Koffler.
The blogger says that as far as he knows, in the Bush administration, at least toward the end of it, only the president and his family, the vice president, the White House chief of staff, the National Security adviser, and the Homeland Security adviser received Secret Service protection.
“It’s possible that Jarrett has received enough specific and credible threats to justify Secret Service protection, or that the Secret Service has for some other reason calculated that she needs bodyguards,” Koffler wrote. “But it’s also possible this is a case of oddly overdoing it – and overusing taxpayer resources.”
He notes that nine out of 10 Americans probably have no idea who Jarrett is.
“White House Press Secretary Jay Carney is far better known and spends his time warning terrorists and our foreign adversaries about bad behavior while trumpeting the killing of Osama Bin Laden,” Koffler quips. “I’m sure he does not have protection.”
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