With the Secret Service under intense scrutiny amid reports that an armed man jumped the fence at the White House and made it all the way to the East Room, the Associated Press is now reporting that earlier this month, the president was on an elevator with an "armed security contractor who had three criminal convictions."
This new report comes after Secret Service Director Julia Pierson sat before members of Congress Tuesday and took full responsibility for the Sept. 19 White House fence-jumper incident. The Washington Post reports that the elevator incident happened during a Sept. 16 visit to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
According to the Post, agents questioned the contractor, who had refused to stop videorecording the president with a camera phone, and learned of his criminal history. The contractor's supervisor fired the man on the spot and then asked that he turn over his gun; this was how Secret Service agents learned that he was armed, according to the news sites.
A Secret Service spokesman confirmed to AP that the incident happened but declined to comment further.
Read more at the Associated Press and the Washington Post.