Suspicious package at the White House delays Obama’s return home - News Spear

Suspicious package at the White House delays Obama’s return home - News Spear

Suspicious package at the White House delays Obama’s return home

— July 18, 2014

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Washington: President Obama was held aboard Air Force One for more than a half-hour after returning to the capital on Thursday night because of a suspicious package found at the White House, a spokesman said.

Mr. Obama, who spent the day traveling in Delaware and New York, landed back at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington just after 10 p.m., but remained on the plane while security back at the White House determined whether the package was dangerous or not.

He emerged from the plane 40 minutes later and boarded Marine One with his aides for the helicopter ride back to the White House. “The president returned to the White House after the package was cleared,” said Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary.

The suspicious package was the third found at the White House on Thursday, adding to the skittishness of a day that seemed to whipsaw the president and his staff between one crisis after another. While the president was on the road to give a speech on infrastructure and attend Democratic fund-raisers, he spent much of the day responding to the downing of a passenger jet in Ukraine and the Israeli ground invasion into Gaza.

The previous two suspicious packages were found at the White House while he was away and prompted the Secret Service to lock down the compound. After the police investigated, the White House was reopened.