News Brief
Swarajya Staff
Jul 06, 2023, 02:30 PM | Updated Jul 07, 2023, 10:47 AM IST
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The unknown “powdery substance” recovered in the White House on Sunday was in fact cocaine, the U.S Secret Service confirmed.
The substance were found within a working area of the West Wing and located within a locker used by employees and guests.
Cocaine is classified as Schedule II drug by US Drug Enforcement Administration under the Controlled Substances Act.
The West Wing is attached to the executive mansion where President Joe Biden resides. It houses the Oval Office, the cabinet room and press area, and offices and workspace for the president's staff.
“On Sunday evening, the White House complex went into a precautionary closure as officers from the Secret Service Uniformed Division investigated an unknown item found inside a work area. The DC Fire Department was called to evaluate and quickly determined the item to be non-hazardous,” the U.S Secret Service said in a statement.
“The item was sent for further evaluation and an investigation into the cause and manner of how it entered the White House is pending,” it further added.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Wednesday the White House is confident the Secret Service will “get to the bottom” of the incident. She confirmed the cocaine was discovered in a “heavily traveled area” of the West Wing that visitors, as well as staff, pass through.
The Secret Service is reportedely going through visitor logs, surveillance video and relying on the analysis of the bag to try to advance their investigation.
Former US President Donald Trump launched a scathing attack on President Joe Biden over the recovery of Cocaine in the White House.
“Does anybody really believe that the COCAINE found in the West Wing of the White House, very close to the Oval Office, is for the use of anyone other than Hunter & Joe Biden,” Trump wrote on microblogging site Truth Social on Wednesday.
“But watch, the Fake News Media will soon start saying that the amount found was ‘very small,’ & it wasn’t really COCAINE, but rather common ground up Aspirin, & the story will vanish. Has Deranged Jack Smith, the crazy, Trump hating Special Prosecutor, been seen in the area of the COCAINE? He looks like a crackhead to me!” he added.
Hunter Biden, President Biden's elder son, is known to struggle with substance abuse.
The New York Post recently revealed that Hunter Biden had apparently filmed himself smoking crack behind the wheel of a car in 2018 . The report was on thousands of newly uploaded photos from the first son’s abandoned laptop.
Senior Republican Senator Tom Cotton wrote to the Secret Service's director with a list of questions about how such a drug could end up in one of the world's most carefully guarded buildings.
He asked about the White House's security and visitor screening process, and how many times drugs have previously been discovered at the presidential mansion.