Trump intruder breaches White House at midnight

Trump intruder breaches White House at midnight. March. 13, 2017 07:54. by Seung-Heon Lee ddr@donga.com.

An intruder has breached White House grounds for the first time since President Donald Trump took office.

CNN reported that a man carrying a backpack jumped over the White House fence at 11:38 p.m. Friday. Washington D.C. police identified the suspect as Jonathan Tran (26) from Milpitas, California. Tran jumped the fence on the south side of the White House complex and got close to the South Portico entrance where President Trump often gave speeches. Mr. Trump was in the residence at the time of breach and was unharmed.

Tran carried a laptop in his backpack but the backpack was found to be free of any hazardous materials. Right after the incident, the White House was placed under security condition “orange,” second highest level among the five graduated levels of security for the Secret Service (SS). CNN said that the SS searched both north and south of the White House and nothing of concern to security operations was found.

It is not the first time that White House security has been breached. There were several breaches during the presidency of Barack Obama and the work discipline of the SS is in the hot seat again. In September 2014, Omar Gonzalez, an Iraq war veteran, jumped the White House fence and the East Room of the residence. Agents recovered 800 rounds of ammunition and hatchets in his car parked nearby the White House.