Trump motorcade driver detained by Secret Service after gun found in his bag

Admin Wed 21 Feb 2018, 9:31 pm

Trump motorcade driver detained by Secret Service after gun found in his bag
February 20, 2018
https://www.conservativeinstitute.org/conservative-news/trump-motorcade-driver-gun.htm?utm_source=aimtell&utm_campaign=automated_push&utm_medium=push
Trump motorcade driver detained by Secret Service after gun found in his bag
Gage Skidmore / CCL
The security surrounding the President of the United States is tight—and for good reason, with repetitive layers of protocols that are done every day, regardless of the situation. The Secret Service has, over time, refined their procedures to not only prevent malicious acts but to also handle inadvertent safety failures that could still endanger the President.

On Monday, one of those protocols caught just such a situation. The Secret Service said that a driver in President Donald Trump’s motorcade was detained by authorities when a gun was found in his baggage outside the Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida.

The Gun in the Bag
All drivers have their bags searched before they are allowed to join the presidential motorcade. During a security screening in a parking lot across from the Mar-a-Lago resort, Secret Service agents found a gun in the bag belonging to one of the drivers of a press van.

The driver told agents that it was a legally owned personal firearm that he normally left in his own vehicle before taking over the motorcade van. The man was not identified, but he was said to be a staff-contracted driver.

While the background check showed that the man’s firearm was legally owned, and his story checked out, he still couldn’t take over the press van. A White House staffer drove the van instead.

The Secret Service released a statement on the incident:

The incident was investigated by the Secret Service and our partners at the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office and resolved. At no time was any Secret Service protectee in danger or impacted. All Secret Service security measures worked.

Jordan Fabian, pool reporter for The Hill, noted that “all drivers were replaced after the incident. When press loaded back into vans, driver was being questioned by an officer.”

There was no further information about who the man was, or whether he would continue to be a staff driver for the Secret Service motorcades.

Protocol Works
President Trump was in Florida to spend President’s Day at his golf club in Palm Beach.

While the incident with the press van driver ended safely, it underlined the constant threat that the president is under — and the measures the Secret Service has to take in order to protect him.

In November 2017, a man attempted to cut off the motorcade, and was pulled over by local law enforcement.

Only a month before, a female cyclist flipped off the motorcade as it passed her on the road; she was later fired when it was determined that she was a government contractor employee.