The ranking member of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee said on CNN this morning that there’s extra concern for President Obama’s safety seeing as how he’s around people with “guns strapped on their legs.”
Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) spoke with Candy Crowley on “State of the Union” about the Secret Service scandal. Cummings and Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) sent a letter to Secret Service director Mark J. Sullivan last week asking for a full accounting of the events and a history past disciplinary trouble with agents’ behavior abroad.
“It bothers me a lot because I know that there are a lot of folks who are perhaps looking for opportunities to do harm to the president or others that the Secret Service, you know, guard,” Cummings said. “And you never know what they think that is a moment of weakness.”
He was asked if he has more concerns for President Obama’s safety because he’s African-American.
“First of all, let me say I have concern about all presidents and everybody that the Secret Service guards,” Cummings said. “But the fact is that African-American people have always expressed concern to me about this president. They see, Candy, folk around this president with guns strapped on their legs. And they say, you know, how can that be?”
“And they’re just — they worry,” he added.
The congressman said he thinks the Cartagena incident was limited to the 11 relieved from duty, “but we’ll find out.”
“So, you know, you can’t, you know, legislate people not being stupid, but certainly you can uphold the high standards of this organization,” Cummings said. “Keep in mind, the Secret Service has been around since 1865, and we’re going to make sure that it remains the great organization that it is.”
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