An
interesting “stand-off’’ of sorts developed outside a barbecue President Obama
was attending at a friend’s house Saturday night between followers of Nation of
Islam leader Louis Farrakhan on one side and members of the press and the U.S. Secret
Service guarding the president on the other.
Just a few blocks from Obama’s home in the
Kenwood/Hyde Park neighborhood, Obama’s friend Marty Nesbitt lives across the
street from the ornate yellow-gold home where Farrakhan lives.
For
the past two years, when Obama has brought his family over to Nesbitt’s home,
the press pool bus parks near Farrakhan’s house. This usually does not cause a
problem, but Saturday night — as most of the city was indoors watching the
Chicago Blackhawks beat the Philadelphia Flyers in the Stanley Cup finals — a
bit of tension emerged on
A
pool report noted that as a dozen reporters and photographers following Obama
stood on the sidewalk in front of Farrakhan’s home, someone’s foot touched the
city-owned curbside grass.
Immediately,
a polite man in jeans and T-Shirt emerged to ask the press to stay off the
grass, the report stated. Soon he was pacing and talking on a cell phone. He
went inside the mansion’s black wrought iron fence, crossed the well-landscaped
yard, lifted a water bucket behind rose bushes and retrieved a walkie-talkie.
He was heard to refer to “the CIA.”
[The
Secret Service is a separate agency from the CIA]
Soon
he approached the secret service agent minding the press and asked him to move
the van and its occupants.
“How
is this a security breach?” the agent asked. He asked
if the house was government property. Neighbors all over
The
man said something else and at that point the agent stuck out his hand to shake
hands and introduced himself as a Secret Service agent. He added, “Sir, I can
assure you that we will do nothing to interfere with whatever is going on in
there.”
The
man paced and talked on his cell phone, walkie-talkie in hand. Three more men
in T-Shirts reading “Wide or Die!’’ joined the man from the Nation of Islam. A
reporter asked one of the men if this was Farrakhan’s house. The man just
stared back. Asked again, he said, “I don't have no
comment.”
Eventually
a dozen “Fruit of Islam” agents arrived. As each casually dressed man arrived,
he exchanged elaborate handshake/hug/double air-kisses with others. Two walked
by a reporter, chanting “Islam.”
The
men filmed and photographed the reporters, the van and its license plates with
their cell phones.
One
came and stood close to reporters and the secret service agent. The secret
service agent asked if he could help. The man did not answer. The agent asked
again. The man said, “No.” The agent said, “Secret Service — please move away from this group of people.”
The
man did.
The
agent asked the reporters to go back into the press bus, which they did.
Before
they did, some asked the Nation of Islam crowd if they could use the rest room
in Farrakahn’s home.
No
offer was made.
Rev.
Gary Hunter, a Baptist minister in Detroit who writes and blogs for the Detroit
Times, told reporter Jackie Calmes of the New York
Times that he called Farrakhan and his son and asked them to have the Fruit
stand down: “I told him you were good people . . . He said he didn’t know you
all were just waiting for the president.’’
The
Blackhawks won the first game of the series around 10 p.m. — and Obama and his
family were driven home at 10:43 p.m., the press bus in tow, ending the
“stand-off.’’
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