The Cost of Security

The drama that played out at Hillary Clinton's campaign headquarters in Rochester, N.H., on Friday afternoon ended without bloodshed--as a local man who had taken hostages and claimed to have a bomb surrendered peaceably. While the campaign, and the country, breathed a sigh of relief, the unsettling episode raised troubling questions about the vulnerabilities of candidates and their campaign operations--and the cost, in the unusually large 2008 field, of maintaining security.

Darrin Blackford, a spokesman for the U.S. Secret Service, says that protecting the 2008 presidential contenders is projected to cost a record-setting $107 million--up substantially from the $74 million price tag in 2004, and the $54 million cost in 2000. Thus far, only Clinton (who, as a former First Lady receives protection for life) and Barack Obama (who reportedly requested help in the face of threats) are being watched over by the Secret Service. But that number is likely to rise as nominating season gets underway. Blackford blames the spiraling cost of security on the fact that Campaign 2008 is the first presidential race since 1952 in which no incumbent is running.

Blackford says the Department of Homeland Security decides which candidates are assigned the agents, though he said all major presidential and vice presidential candidates are eligible. The contenders' prominence--along with the amount of money in federal matching funds they pull in--are factors in deciding who gets protection.

Still, there are limits to what the Secret Service can do--and it is difficult to imagine how any candidate could guard against the kind of episode that occurred in New Hampshire. NEWSWEEK spoke with retired Secret Service agent Joseph J. Funk about campaign security. Funk, who now operates U.S. Safety and Security, a private company, provided protection to Obama from February through May of this year before the Secret Service stepped in. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: How long were you in the Secret Service?
Joseph J. Funk: I was in the Secret Service for 21 years. I retired in March of '04 and during my time of permanent protection--which is when you're assigned to a particular person full time--I did four years with the first President Bush and four and a half years with President Clinton … Now that I'm in the private-security field, I was hired to be a security entity for Senator Obama as he was running his campaign last February. I was with him for four and a half months prior to the Secret Service picking up protection full time.

Do candidates need protection now more than ever?
Attacks on political figures have been going on--you could go back to Julius Caesar if you really wanted to. So this is not a new phenomenon. And quite frankly, there were probably more attacks a century ago. We lost three presidents in succession, starting with Lincoln, which was one of the reasons the Secret Service was formed. So, I'm not so sure that there are as many instances. It's just there's better reporting by people like yourself. It's more newsworthy. I think that security, whether it's the Secret Service or local law enforcement, is better. The people out there who have an interest in harming a political figure--they might be getting found out about prior to being able to do anything.