White House State Dinner Party Crashers: Fame or Crime?

Instead of President & First Lady Obama along with India's Prime Minister Manmohan & Mrs. Singh remaining the focus of the Obama's first state dinner, it is Tareq & Michaele Salahi that have stolen the media spotlight. Not to mention that the uninvited couple won photo ops with some of the biggest power players on Pennsylvania Avenue, as they took pictures with White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. But their biggest catch was a photo-shoot with none less than the #2 man of the United States, VP Joe Biden himself. The Salahis have the Facebook evidence on their successful adventures. As of the writing of this article, Facebook seemed to have taken down Michaele and Tareq Salahis' page.

The big joke may be on the Obama White House, whose security credentials have now come under scrutiny. This after the low-flying aircraft debacle of April 2009. One logical query by non-Obamaics is, "If this bunch can't secure the house where they live and party, how can they oversee the security of the United States?"

Incompetence can be a delicious word for those who have already concluded this administration doesn't know much of anything it's doing.

Reports Jake Tapper, Senior White House Correspondent of ABC, "It's one of the most secure places on earth, but two Washington area socialites and reality TV wannabes were apparently able to get behind the gates at the White House and mingle with the crowd at the State Dinner in honor of India last night."*

Who were the party crashers (if they did crash the party)? They are Tareq and Michaele Salahi, labeled as "socialites and reality TV wannabes".* They are further described as "polo-playing socialites".*
Mrs. Salahi claims to be a former Redskins cheerleader. The Salahis are a "Virginia couple who reportedly want to be on the D.C. version of Bravo's 'Real Housewives' series."*

According to NBC Washington, Michaela is a model and wife of Tareq Salahi, president of America's Polo Cup and owner of Oasis Winery. Tareq Salahi reportedly runs Oasis Winery near the Shenandoah. The winery's website claims it is "one of the top 10 in the world -- the only North American winery to make the list."*

The Washington Post says, "Even before their brush with reality TV fame, the couple had gained some notoriety for a long-running feud with Tareq's parents, Dirgham and Corinne Salahi, over control of the family's Oasis Winery in Hume, Virginia. Last year, Tareq accused his mother's attorney of punching him; the lawyer was found not guilty. Court records show that Oasis filed for bankruptcy in February, with Tareq listed as 'debtor designee'".*

On the embarrassment this flamboyant couple has dealt the White House, Ed Donovan, Secret Service spokesperson, said the agency is looking "into a report that two individuals not on the guest list were in the event."

To stress that there was never a security risk, Donovan said, "Everyone that goes into the white house grounds goes through magnetometers and other levels of screening."

Besides the publicity-stunt value of this incident, did the Salahis commit a crime? In a Thanksgiving Day statement, Mahogany Jones, the Salahis' publicist, said the couple's counsel, Paul W. Gardner, "states emphatically that the Salahis' did not 'crash' this event. Jones added, "We look forward to setting the record straight very soon."*

For his part, Paul Morrison, a Virginia lawyer who in the past has represented the Salahis, downplayed the couple's action by saying, "They just went to a party. They didn't do anything wrong."*
However, a former government official begs to differ. He told CNN, "If you lie to a federal official, either secret service or the social secretary, if they lied their way to get in, and it seems they would have had to have done that, that's a federal felony."

Whether or not the Salahis has done something worthy of a crime, one thing is sure: they have gained that coveted American prize: ATTENTION. And to realty-TV-types, any attention is better than no attention. In that case the Salahis getting on national television at the expense of the Obama White House's security lapse can be nothing less than a realty-TV jackpot.

But consider this: What if this couple did not crash the party after all? What if they got insider help to slip into the dinner halls under the security radar? That is a real possibility, but we shall see.

* Sources: ABC News, NBC Washington, Washington Post