White House Party Intruders

WASHINGTON — The cable network Bravo confirmed on Thursday that its cameras were following — and filming — an aspiring reality-show couple who managed to attend President Obamas first state dinner at the White House on Tuesday.

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Tareq and Michaele Salahi with Vice President Joe Biden at the state dinner on Tuesday night.
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At Obamas First State Dinner, the First Crashers (November 26, 2009)

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In a statement to The New York Times on Thursday, Bravo said that Half Yard Productions, the producers for the series The Real Housewives of D.C., was under the impression that Michaele and Tarek Salahi, two polo-playing devotees of Washingtons social swirl and on-line social networks alike, had been invited to the biggest and most exclusive soiree to take place in Washington this year.

The cast of The Real Housewives of D.C. has not been finalized, Bravo said in the statement. Michaele Salahi is under consideration as a cast member, as such Half Yard Productions were filming the Salahis on that day. Half Yard was only aware that per the Salahis they had been invited as guests.

A White House official, informed of Bravos statement, said that was not the case. Weve already confirmed that they werent invited, he said.

A publicist for the couple, Mahogany Jones, said they would not comment formally for now.

Their counsel, Paul W. Gardner Esq. states emphatically that the Salahis did not crash this event, the statement said. We look forward to setting the record straight very soon."

Mr. Gardner, an entertainment lawyer, did not respond to a message left at his Baltimore office, which was closed for the holiday.

The Secret Service — which one Homeland Security official described as completely embarrassed by the incident — has begun an investigation into how the pair managed to get through multiple layers of high-level security to crash the affair, where they managed to rub shoulders, literally, with Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and the White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, among others. Edwin Donovan, a spokesman for the Secret Service who spent his Thanksgiving Day fending off phone calls from reporters, said the investigation was continuing, but would not discuss it in detail.

He said the initial focus was on a Secret Service checkpoint which did not follow proper procedure to ensure these two individuals were on the invited guest list.

White House officials maintained that even though the pair got into the state dinner without an invitation, they did have to go through all the metal detectors that everyone passes through when entering the White House.

Other security experts described the episode as very serious.

Its crazy to say that, because theres a reason they do background checks and theres a reason they make sure to only let in people who have been pre-approved, said Ronald Kessler, author of In the Presidents Secret Service: Behind the Scenes with Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents They Protect (Crown).

Indeed, he said, an intruder could have sneaked something dangerous into the crowd.

A serial killer or terrorist or agent of Iran or North Korea could come in and release anthrax, for instance, and thats not going to show up in a metal detectors, Mr. Kessler said. He added that the Secret Service, in particular, should have been extra vigilant because threats against the president have increased by 400 percent since George W. Bush was in power.

The incident — already an embarrassment for both the White House and the Secret Service — drew all the more attention in the publicity-conscious era of online social networking. Not two hours after showing up at the party, Mrs. Salahi had posted on her Facebook page a dozen photos of herself and her husband partying with Washingtons social elite.

There the couple was, with Mayor Adrian Fenty of the District of Columbia, and his lovely wife Michelle (Mrs. Salahi is holding Mr. Fentys elbow.) There Mrs. Salahi was, with three Marines in their full-dress attire (her hand is touching the collar of one Marine, who smiles at the camera). And the two money shots: Mrs. Salahi, her red and gold sari glittering, snaked around a grinning Mr. Biden, her hand resting on his chest, his arm wrapped around her waist; and both Salahis, with a smiling Mr. Emanuel, described on Mrs. Salahis Facebook page as Chief of Staff of the United States White House.

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• Obama
• white
• house
• party
• crashers
• intruders
• specail
• forces
• CIA
• body
• guards

[mispistoleros]

what the media failed to report:

from "Refugee Resettlement Watch",

"White House gate crashers connected to radical Palestinian group"

"Tareq Salahi, the polo-playing intruder, is a Palestinian nationalist with ties to the American Task Force on Palestine (ATFP) , a pro-Palestine lobby demanding the right of return for all Palestinian refugees and their descendants.

Theyve (the media) been treating it like gossip, with perhaps some questions about security."

[fasterthanabullet]

Now i know why 9 11 attack happened. Poor usa security shit :)

[jacklambertwilson]

Bimbo.

[fran9860]

what color is the hair on her vagina?

[la9777]

What you do was wrong. The sad part is that you do not feel that you did anything. You were not even invited. And you walk around like you are the s***. You put a smear on this state and you think that this is a joke and according to the search you were not even a cheer leader. Should you spend some time, yes. You did this as a prank

[vergarafrank]

If I was Obama I would look for that couple at the party myself and beat the shit out of that guy and take that sexually deprived lady to the Lincoln bedroom and fuck the shit out of that sweet PUSSY! Thats the best way to handle it.

[loonytoon500]

she got in because shes a cheerleader and men are FOOLS.

[lane9912]

She initially said "Gay Crashers"

[boneyfreak2004]

9/11 conspiracy....please, stay home with your aluminum foil hats on and help keep the streets of America safe...and PLEASE! Sterilize yourselves....

[PanzerBlitz43]

Nope, 911 happened because nobody stopped the CIA from planting bombs in the twin towers or from training and radicalizing saudis-bush's best friends-to fly planes.