The former guard at the center of a security breach incident during President Barack Obama’s September visit to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spoke out Monday, saying he was being wrongly accused.
Kenneth Tate, 49, of Atlanta was fired after he was accused by the Secret Service of behaving erratically and of taking unauthorized pictures of the president, who was at the CDC for a briefing on the Ebola outbreak on Sept. 16. The episode was one of several critical lapses by the Secret Service that led to the resignation of the service’s director, Julia Pierson. Some initial news reports of the CDC incident described Tate, who was armed, as a felon.
But Monday, Tate began what amounted to a media tour, giving interviews telling his side of the story, one that for him, professionally and personally, has an uncertain ending.
“They say I was acting belligerent,” Tate said. “How am I going to act crazy and belligerent with 13 people on the elevator, including the president, without me being taken out?”
Tate said he began working with the CDC 11 years ago as an employee for Walden Security, a private firm. Though he had been arrested for misdemeanor simple assault charges in the 1990s in Atlanta, those three charges were dismissed, said his attorney, Christopher Chestnut.
Over the years Tate worked his way up. As of late spring this year, when he began working with Professional Security Corp., which also holds contracts with the CDC, Tate had long been a trusted guard responsible for providing escorts for visiting dignitaries and politicians, he said.
He rattled them off: former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, former Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, and ambassadors from around the world. He also filled in for other security employees on their breaks and was authorized to allow employees back into their offices or research areas if they accidentally locked themselves out.
“If they needed something, they called me,” Tate said.
A federal official with knowledge of the investigation into the Obama visit, but who was not authorized to speak publicly about the guard, said the investigation showed Tate had been considered a “good security guard” over those 11 years and the CDC had not had “any problems with him.” Professional Security Corp. did not respond to email or telephone requests on Monday for an interview.
As part of his job Tate was given a .40-caliber handgun with 27 rounds each morning when he came to work. He said he took off work on Sept. 15 to celebrate his birthday and returned the next day to find out he’d be escorting the president and his entourage for the Ebola briefing. It was an assignment he was proud of. And, as always, he was given his gun, he said.
“I was chosen, I was appointed, I was the best one they had, that’s what they told me,” Tate said, referring to the top security managers at the CDC who assigned him to the president’s detail.
So at 2:25 p.m., the day after his birthday, Tate and his colleagues were told that the president’s motorcade had arrived. Secret Service agents had been in the building in advance and had brought along their own screeners and surveillance equipment.
Tate said his job was to escort agents anywhere they asked to go and to operate the elevator for the president and his group. For the next hour and a half, that’s what Tate did, he said. On the elevator, Obama asked Tate his name and even shook his hand. Tate said he did not interact any further with the president or his advisers during the elevator ride, disputing initial reports that said he was behaving erratically around the president.
However, the federal official who requested anonymity in order to speak on the matter said Tate did not follow directions and was told not to leave the elevator. The official also said that Tate initially denied taking pictures of the president. Tate disputes this.
For his part, Tate said he followed orders until “the detail was over.” But the definition of “over” seems to have resulted in Tate’s troubles. Tate said he left the elevator after the president was in a loading dock area just prior to his departure. That’s when Tate walked past two Secret Service agents and took three pictures with his cellphone camera. Tate had hoped to send them to his mother to make her proud of him. One of the photos was blurry, the other was of a car tire, Tate said, but it didn’t matter. He soon found himself being questioned by his superiors and within minutes was told to turn in his badge and gun.
Two days later he found out he was officially fired by his employer, though the federal official said there was a request that Tate be “reassigned.”
Now the Atlanta man is looking for another job.
“When I walked by (the Secret Service) agent, he said, ‘Somebody’s going to lose their job over this,’” Tate said. “I didn’t know it was going to be me.”
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