Bone spurs? Donald Trump takes an eight-car motorcade from the White House to cross the road
- US President Donald Trump’s short journey was to visit George W. Bush at the nearby Blair House guest quarters, ahead of the funeral of George H.W. Bush
- The Secret Service may have requested that Trump make the journey by limousine
US President Donald Trump is taking criticism for using an eight-car motorcade to travel across the street from the White House to welcome the Bush family at the Blair House guest quarters.
A Washington Post article cited a former Obama administration official who said previous presidents, including Barack Obama, “have made that walk before.”
“Bone spurs?” CNN national security analyst Sam Vinograd sarcastically wondered, referring to a medical condition cited as the explanation for Trump’s fifth deferment from the draft during the Vietnam war.
But observers suggested that the Secret Service likely requested Trump take the motorcade journey, which amounted to about 250 metres. Twitter users pointed to a passage from former first lady Michelle Obama’s new book Becoming in which she said the Secret Service would sometimes request she and her husband take a motorcade across the street.
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“If Barack or I had a meeting in Blair House, located just across an already closed-off part of Pennsylvania Avenue, they’d sometimes request that we take the motorcade instead of walking in the fresh air,” she wrote. “We respected the watchfulness, but it could feel like a form of confinement.”
Washington Post reporter David Nakamura tweeted that while he found six examples of Obama walking across the street to visit Blair House, he had not yet been able to find an example of him using a motorcade to do so.
One Twitter user argued that we would all take a motorcade to cross the street in winter if we were blessed with the opportunity.
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“We drag Trump for a lot, but let’s not pretend we wouldn’t use an 8 car motorcade to cross the street in winter if we could,” tweeted screenwriter and producer Bob Schooley.
