[News] Vehicle Crashes Into Security Gate Outside the White House

[BUTA]

The Secret Service said the driver was arrested and there was no longer a threat. President Trump was in the White House at the time, the agency said.

 

 

A person drove a vehicle into a security gate outside the White House on Tuesday night, the Secret Service said. A man was arrested and there was no threat to President Trump, who was in the complex, according to the agency.

The person drove the vehicle into a barrier at the corner of 17th and E Streets at about 10:30 p.m. Eastern, the Secret Service said. The car was a 2010 Acura TSX with Maryland license plates, according to public records.

 

The Secret Service did not release any details about the driver. It was not immediately known whether the crash was intentional, or why the driver approached the White House.

Mr. Trump was in the White House at the time of the incident, the Secret Service said. The White House was not placed on lockdown, but the road leading to the gate will remain closed until the police tow the vehicle away, the Secret Service added.

Much attention has focused on the White House this week because of the ongoing demolition of the East Wing to build a new ballroom.

There have been other vehicle crashes at the White House gates in recent years, including one in May 2024 and another in January 2024. In May 2023, a driver crashed a rented U-Haul truck into a gate and later told the authorities that he had been planning to kill former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

The incidents have happened despite efforts to limit access to roads around the White House for vehicles and pedestrians since the 1990s. The stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the Treasury Department, the White House and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building has been closed to cars since 1995, after the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City.

In 1994, a gunman was able to pierce a window of the White House with bullets while President Bill Clinton was in the building’s living quarters. And in 2015, a man climbed over a fence as President Barack Obama and his family were celebrating Thanksgiving inside.

And the security of politicians has been in the spotlight after two assassination attempts on Mr. Trump last year, along with recent high-profile attacks on major figures from both major parties. Earlier this year, Melissa Hortman, a Democratic state lawmaker in Minnesota, was killed in what officials described as a political assassination. And last month, Charlie Kirk, Mr. Trump’s ally, was fatally shot at a university campus in Utah.

 

HERE