The South Florida town where Hillary Clinton is holding a campaign event Friday has refused to participate in her security detail, causing a dust-up among law enforcement agencies.Rico says most people wish this whole campaign would go away...
Clinton will attend what is being billed as a “grass-roots” rally Friday afternoon at Broward College in Davie, Florida, a town of ninety thousand people about 25 miles north of Miami. The college is accustomed to dignitary visits: the school hosted last year’s debate for governor and has provided security for Michelle Obama, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his wife, Jill, and even the Dalai Lama.
But this time, when crowd expectations began to swell, the Davie Police Department balked at spending several extra thousand dollars on police overtime, according to several people familiar with the preparations.
The town’s sudden turnabout raised eyebrows about whether the decision was political in nature. Broward County is a Democratic stronghold where President Obama won 67 percent of the vote in 2012. But Davie is a rural enclave, with an old western atmosphere that stands out from the rest of the county. A rally in support of the Confederate flag took place this summer nearby.
An assistant police chief who attended an interagency meeting to prepare for the visit announced the news that the city would not provide security. The Secret Service officials who were at the meeting did not take it well, and promised to name names about the episode if ever called before Congress, according to one of the people at the meeting, who was not authorized to discuss the private session.
The Secret Service turned to the local sheriff’s office, Broward College’s security team, and nearby Florida Atlantic University for extra assistance.
“When you task a small municipality like Davie, it’s tough on them. They have a budget and it’s hard to stay within budget when something like that happens,” said William Cachinero, assistant special agent in charge of the Miami field office. “We were recently there with the vice president. It probably ate up their budget for the month.”
It’s not the first time an agency has pushed back on the added costs. In 2001, officials in Kennebunkport, Maine, said they would not offer any more help for George W. Bush’s visits to his family’s summer estate unless the Federal government reimbursed the costs.
In 2008, the mayor of a Kentucky town was miffed that the Clinton campaign stiffed the city on a $142 bill. The local paper found that the campaign regularly reimbursed cities for security costs.
The Clinton campaign referred questions to the Secret Service, which in turn said that it relies on local support, but doesn’t pay for it.
“While we understand this support often results in costs to the communities that host protective visits, the Secret Service is not funded to reimburse communities for these costs and the Secret Service does not pay for police overtime associated with protective visits,” said Robert Hoback, an agency spokesman.
The Davie Police Department declined to say how much that tab would have been.
“We are working with the Secret Service to provide a safe environment to the people going,” said Captain Dale Engle. “There is a cost associated with providing that security.”
02 October 2015
Hillary for the day
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