There's a new party demanding answers about the cocaine found in the West Wing on Sunday as the Biden White House's story changes about where, exactly, the bag of drugs was found and the administration refuses to say whether it will be transparent with the American people about a U.S. Secret Service investigation with which Karine Jean-Pierre said team Biden was "not assisting."
House Oversight Committee James Comer (R-KY) fired off a letter to Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle on Friday requesting information necessary to provide oversight of the agency and answer growing questions about White House security and protocols that apparently failed to detect a bag of cocaine being brought onto the premises until after it was inside the West Wing at a location near the Situation Room.
Comer explained that his committee is now investigating the "alarming development" because the situation "requires the Committee to assess White House security practices and determine whose failures led to an evacuation of the building and finding of the illegal substance."
In a statement on his letter to the Secret Service, Comer reminded that "Congress funds White House security procedures, and the Secret Service has a responsibility to maintain effective safety protocols" and, as such, his committee "has oversight jurisdiction over USSS operations, and I look forward to additional information from Director Cheatle."
"The presence of illegal drugs in the White House is unacceptable and a shameful moment in the White House's history," Comer continued in his request for information. "This incident has raised additional concerns with the Committee regarding the level of security maintained at the White House."
Indeed. As Katie and I discussed Wednesday evening, the White House admitting that an individual could get into the West Wing with a bag of white powder raises some serious security questions:
Thankfully, it was "just" cocaine, but Comer is right to question how the White House and Secret Service seek (or don't adequately seek) to keep the White House and its occupants safe from such potential threats.
The next step in the Oversight Committee's investigation, according to Comer's letter, is a "staff level briefing" from the Secret Service which he requested by next Friday, July 14.
If the Biden White House is hoping for a quick and inconclusive conclusion to put cocainegate behind it — and it sure seems like that's what officials are seeking — and if the Secret Service was planning on playing along with the administration's convenient outcome, the Oversight Committee isn't going to let that happen without due scrutiny.
That timeline, however, might mean the briefing comes after the conclusion of the Secret Service's investigation. According to reporting from NBC News on Thursday, "investigators expect to be done with the investigation by Monday," a shorter timeline than the previously estimated "couple of weeks."
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