TAMPA, Fla. — The security breach at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on Saturday has led to questions about security protocols at the event.
Tampa Bay 28 spoke with former FBI special agent Richard Kolko, and he said even though the suspect was able to get past security at a security checkpoint, safety measures worked to keep those inside the event safe.
"People are trying to characterize this as a failure of security; in reality, it worked," Kolko explained. "This is what is supposed to happen. This person breached the outer perimeter, came running through, and law enforcement, Secret Service agents were able to take him down, before he got past the magnetometers, before he got to the door of the ballroom, and before he even got close to the president."
Kolko said events like the correspondents' dinner, which happen every year, are well-equipped to handle security breaches like this.
"Secret service tactical teams do what is called 'sit on their bags,' which means they are on site, ready to deploy at a moment's notice, and we saw them come out from behind the curtain dressed tactically and ready to protect the president.”
Pop-up events like the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania on June 13, 2024, are harder to prepare for, Kolko said, since most of the time the Secret Service has not worked with local law enforcement, making them more complex for agents.
Regardless of the threats, Kolko does not see events outside of the White House with the president stopping because of recent incidents.
"If you ask any Secret Service agent, they would like to always lock the president up in the White House cause that’s where they know they can keep him safe, but that’s not the way the real world works," Kolko said.
"The politicians, they go out into the real world, they meet and greet people. They’ve got business to do outside of the White House. So, at the end of the day, the president is the boss. They say where they are going to go, and attending events like this, that’s not going to stop."
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