The Denver 3 post update at DFA....kicked out of Bush rally. [View All]

[madfloridian]

There is more about this in LBN, but this is an update posted by them at Blog for America.
http://www.blogforamerica.com/archives/006146.html

The Denver 3 Speak Out
Alex Young, Karen Bauer and Leslie Weise were removed from a "town hall" event in Denver, CO last week where President Bush appeared to discuss his Social Security privatization plan. They sent DFA an update on their story after meeting with Secret Service agents today.

Very rarely does the everyday public get a glimpse of what happens behind the scenes in a normally-secret Bush Administration.

But today, the Secret Service called three everyday people (Alex Young, 25, an IT professional; Karen Bauer, 38, a marketing coordinator and Leslie Weise, 39, a lawyer) into their offices to discuss why we were kicked out of a presidential event in Denver last week where Bush promoted his plan to privatize Social Security. What they revealed to us and our lawyer was fascinating.

There we were—three people who had personally picked up tickets from Republican Congressman Bob Beauprez's office and went to a presidential event. But as we entered, we were told that we had been "ID'ed" and were warned that any disruption would get us arrested.

After being seated in the audience we were forcibly removed before the President arrived, even though we had not been disruptive. We were shocked when told that this presidential event was a "private event" and were commanded to leave...."
More astonishingly, when the Secret Service was contacted the next day they agreed to meet with us this Monday, March 28 to discuss the circumstances surrounding our removal. We had two big questions going into this meeting:

1) How is the Bush Administration "ID'ing" citizens before presidential events?

2) Why was an official taxpayer-funded event called a "private event"—leading to citizens being kicked out?

Most shocking of all, we got answers to both questions.

The Secret Service revealed that we were "ID'ed" when local Republican staffers saw a bumper sticker on the car we drove which said "No More Blood For Oil." Evidently, the free speech expressed on one bumper sticker is cause enough to eject three citizens from a presidential event. (Similarly, someone was ejected from Bush's Social Security privatization event in Arizona the same day simply for wearing a Democratic t-shirt.)

More at the link

Karen Bauer, Leslie Weise, Alexander Young
Denver residents