Some of have you asked for an update on our friends in the Denver Three (Alex Young, Karen Bauer, and Leslie Weise), whom, you’ll recall, were removed from a public presidential event because a Republican staffer didn’t like their anti-war bumper sticker.
The three have been remarkably successful in keeping their story alive, White House efforts not withstanding. Indeed the Denver Three visited Washington last week and were frequently surrounded by reporters as they worked their way from one lawmaker to the next. Even Republicans from Colorado agreed that the aggrieved deserve responses to their questions.
They trek across the Capitol grounds to the office of Sen. Wayne Allard (R-Colo.). Fox News is playing, and there’s a photo of Bush’s inauguration on the wall — not home turf for the Denver Three. But Chief of Staff Sean Conway is solicitous, taking notes and nodding. “I think they’re entitled to some answers,” Conway says after they leave.
The primary question that needs an answer is who, exactly, removed the Denver Three from Bush’s event while pretending to be a Secret Service agent. The White House and the Secret Service know who was responsible, but both have decided to cover up the information. Late last week, a U.S. attorney in Denver indicated he might be willing to help shine some light on the issue.
The Secret Service says it will let the U.S. Attorney’s Office decide whether to file criminal charges of impersonating a Secret Service agent against a volunteer who ousted three people from a presidential speech in Denver on March 21.
The move passes responsibility for the politically touchy decision from the president’s bodyguard agency to the Denver district’s acting U.S. attorney, William Leone.
The Secret Service has told interested members of Congress that this “remains an ongoing criminal case,” as the agency continues to investigate what transpired. Fine. But if laws were broken, and they apparently were, than there’s every reason the U.S. attorney’s office in Denver to intervene.
Stay tuned.