Well, luckily for the former president*‘s campaign, it wasn’t raining on Monday, when he grotesquely used Arlington National Cemetery as a campaign prop because, as we know, he gets a little nervous around soldiers’ graves in the rain, and he says things that require him to lie his ass off later. Most recently, of course, he devalued the Congressional Medal of Honor in favor of a bauble he draped on Rush Limbaugh and the wife of one of the sleaziest of his sleazy donors.
“When you’re a star, they let you do it”
Edit: I was 100% making a joke, but it seems to actually be that: https://www.npr.org/2024/08/27/nx-s1-5091154/trump-arlington-cemetery
I think the question still stands. Who specifically let him in, because this was a failure of some sort of chain of command at the cemetery
Per the Arlington National Cemetery’s site (which is a
.milTLD) states:And when on guard duty, the greenest buck Private has full authority to stop the Secretary of the Army themselves if they refuse to provide identification and authorization for their presence at the posting said Private is guarding. So the correct and appropriate answer would have been to immediately restrain and arrest whoever was doing the pushing and intimidating, as well as any other shitass in the group who was trying to play fucky-fuck games like this.
Sure, but imagine being in that kid’s position. Not only would you be attempting to detain a man (the former Commander in Chief, believe it or not) with his own Secret Service detail, but you would likely end up with a bunch of unwanted attention and subsequent death and rape threats from Trump supporters.
How sad is it that this is what this man has done to American politics? That so many people still support this gutter trash, really showing their true faces.
I get what you’re saying, but the correct response is still “call it in, then arrest his bitch ass”. Not to mention, I’d be a bit surprised if the duty officers don’t have some sort of prep briefing about politicians doing stupid shit in/around the cemetery, and specific guidelines on how to handle such asshattery.
Maybe… But that’s with the benefit of hindsight (and being nowhere near the actual situation).
What I mean is that in a more serious security situation, if a guard were to allow an unauthorized person into an area they were told to keep unauthorized people out of, the guard would probably be brought up on charges for dereliction of duty. The US Army is not the Russian Army; we actually take that shit fairly seriously (by we, I mean country-wise; I am not personally a serviceperson/vet).
Edit: not to mention, I’m pretty sure they do drills with senior officers playing the “bad guy” for specifically this reason, and you fail if you let the officer in just because he blusters/is an asshole to you. It’s just social engineering at the end of the day, and they train to mitigate it. It’s a major threat vector in basically ANY controlled space, regardless of whether it’s military or civilian.
Oh no, if there was a military checkpoint there’d be a sergeant there too, and they do not give a fuck. Someone above them might fold and tell the sergeant to let them through but they will not back down. There’s a lot of stories of people getting shot trying to force a checkpoint, and only a couple of someone actually intimidating a guard to let them through. USSS avoids such situations by not trying to force military checkpoints.
Arlington National Cemetery does not have such a checkpoint.
Sure, but we’re not talking about some random dude, are we? The man was literally the commander-in-chief of the US military for 4 years making him literally their boss.
On top of that, it’s fucking Donald Trump and his (armed) cronies pushing the person aside.
Somehow I doubt some young Private working guard duty at a cemetery is going to opt to brandish his firearm against the US Secret Service in the presence of the former (and possibly future, ugh) President of the United States. They’re not going to get into a fucking fire fight with the goddamn Secret Service at Arlington Cemetery. Get real.
If this were a military installation of some sort, or Gitmo or something, then yeah. But that shit ain’t happening at a cemetery.
Of course not. Because Arlington National Cemetery does not have a military checkpoint.
I’m pretty sure I said that above. Also if it was an actual military checkpoint it’s not going to be one private. Also also the USSS avoids this by not forcing checkpoints and not allowing the people they protect to do so. Also also also, he’s not their boss now. Also also also also, being your boss isn’t a reason to be allowed through a checkpoint in the military.
I’m pretty sure I said 99% of this above and you just wanted to go after some cemetery shootout strawman.
Well it’s a cemetery, so no shit it’s not a military checkpoint. You’re the only one talking about military checkpoints. You seem to have some picture in your mind of Donald Trump trying to get through actual military checkpoint (again, why the fuck?), and there being an armed standoff between the Secret Service and the US Military. This isn’t a movie, dude.
Like no shit the situation wouldn’t be possible at a military checkpoint, the Secret Service would never approach a checkpoint like that.
-Gravitas
-Prole
You’ve been talking about them this entire time. Which is why my post ended with,
Beacon of reality in this post, not sure why you’re downvoted
It’s not a base though, you can just drive into Arlington National Cemetery if you have someone buried there. He came in with family so the people at that end didn’t have anything suspicious. It was probably luck someone was even nearby to notice the extra staffers.
do they have the authority to keep him out completely? they drew a line at the new section which is where the altercation was.
I don’t know what rights the public have to Arlington but you could absolutely bar the equipment to do the photo shoot from entering.
Another article says that federal law prohibits the actions the staff were, at that time, attempting to carry out. I would hope that a federal employee can enforce federal law.
It’s a public cemetery, so I don’t take issue with him being there and acting respectfully. The problem comes when he uses it as a publicity stunt and gives the thumbs up when he’s placing the wreath.
It’s specifically against federal law to use military cemeteries for campaign purposes. Presidents often lay of wreath there on Memorial Day, but they’re already President and not campaigning.
We have enough issues in the US with glorifying the military for political purposes. Let’s not go backwards on this one.
it is not a public cemetery it is military property
That allows the public to enter.