Cirque Du Salahi: Be Careful Who You Trust (17 page)

Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, a Democrat from Mississippi, obviously didn’t get the memo that the White House would rather the scandal go away. His panel had been making noise from the get-go about the Salahis coming to testify. Committee member Sheila Jackson Lee had already been quoted calling the Salahis “the perpetrators.” Her colleague on the committee, Eleanor Holmes Norton had declared, “Clearly they were outlaws before they crashed the White House.”

The Salahis’ attorney, Stephen Best, wrote a letter to Thompson informing him that his clients had been fully cooperative with the Secret Service and, given the ongoing federal investigation if subpoenaed to testify, they would be instructed to invoke their constitutional right to remain silent. Just about every lawyer in the land would have instructed the Salahis to do the same.

The committee’s attitude was, “the show must go on!” and preparations for the public hearings commenced—to be televised, of course.

On January 20, 2010, Tareq and Michaele Salahi responded to a congressional subpoena and had to sit through hours of scathing speeches and withering questions. Behind them was a row of seats reserved for Bravo TV executives, which remained empty. The Salahis invoked their constitutional right to remain silent time after time.

Chairman Thompson waxed poetic about the committee having a duty as overseer of homeland security to figure out “how two ordinary people were able to defeat the (White House) security system.” Maybe he’d forgotten that at the previous hearing Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan had admitted that it was solely his agency’s failure and responsibility.

Nonetheless, Congressman Charlie Dent’s speechifying on the day the Salahis appeared included blaming them for causing “public humiliation and embarrassment” for the Director of the Secret Service … “it’s because of your actions he had to come and be grilled by us like that.”

Representative Pete Olson of Texas scolded, “I want to make sure you realize what an incredible position you put our country in by crashing that state dinner. The terrorists are out there and they are trying to hurt us….you presented them with a text book of how to get in (to the White House.)” Apparently Olson hadn’t bothered to learn that the Salahis got in to the White House by showing valid passports and getting Secret Service permission to enter, not exactly the way a terrorist might go about it.

But no one acted more the buffoon that day than Congressman Bill Pascrell of New Jersey. He stumbled through an opening statement, said he did not respect their right to take the fifth and refuse to answer questions, and then Pascrell moved in for what he thought would be the kill—or rather “the” sound bite for the evening news that night.

“Mr. Salahi, did you wear a tuxedo that night? You gonna take the fifth on that?” When Tareq began to assert that right, Pascrell jumped in, “Let me ask you this! Were you there? Are you here right now? You gotta get an answer from your attorney on that?!” Pascrell was right about one thing—he made the evening news.

It was a shameful stage play put on by the top-ranking leaders of our country, the lawmakers tasked with keeping the nation safe in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Without all the facts and with no charges having been filed, they proceeded to vilify the Salahis as long as the cameras rolled. So much for the axiom, “innocent until proven guilty.” The Salahis’ attorney, a well respected partner in one of DC’s most prestigious law firms, had written to the committee beforehand, “They have fully co- operated with the Secret Service … They have provided documentation, including telephone records and copies of e-mails with a White House official, to the investigating agents.” Yet, not one member of Congress asked attorney Steve Best or the Salahis about their actual evidence.

Best gave a powerful statement outside the committee room at the end of the disgraceful hearing. Only MSNBC carried it live and TV viewers would be hard pressed to have seen it anywhere else. It didn’t fit the media agenda that the Salahis were the villains.

This was not a hearing looking for information; this was an opportunity for a public flogging … If they were interested in learning the true facts of this case, they would have subpoenaed (Social Secretary) Desiree Rodgers and every other relevant person from the White House. If the committee was truly interested in learning the true facts of this case, they would have subpoenaed Michele Jones to tell the true story here today.

The Salahis are innocent and have committed no criminal act.
I repeat, the Salahis have committed no criminal act.
They made no misrepresentations. In fact, two Secret Service investigators, known to this committee, were privy to information … (that) the Salahis were 100% invited to the White House that evening. Nonetheless, this committee did not want to hear this information …

This was not part of a publicity stunt. They believed - 100% believed - in their hearts that they were invited to the White House that night. They have turned down multiple offers to be rewarded handsomely for their story from various members of the media. They are not here to profit from this. They are Americans: they are proud Americans. What happened that night may have been a misunderstanding … but it was a misunderstanding caused by members of the government, not the Salahis.

The hearings weren’t the only humiliation for the Salahis. They had been getting a steady stream of hateful mail at their home. Some were death threats to the couple who “dared to embarrass our president.” One piece of mail included a used condom and the most frightening contained a promise that “me and a group of my n——ers are coming to bind you up and rape your wife while you watch!”

The newspapers and TV were full of news about a federal grand jury being impaneled to decide whether the Salahis should be charged with a crime. Rosemary Holt, Paul Gardner, Admiral Stephen Rochon, Salon owner Erwin Gomez (who arrived at the courthouse in a white stretch limo) and just about anyone the couple had contact with on the day of the White House event was called to give secret testimony. The strain on the Salahis of not knowing whether they’d be indicted for a criminal offense was overwhelming and it lasted for months.

On January 15, 2010, five days before their mandatory appearance on Capitol Hill, the stress invaded Michaele’s body. She got a raging bladder infection, which is not uncommon for MS sufferers. She called her long time physician in Fairfax, Virginia but the office was already closed for the night. When his emergency nurse Cynthia Moseley was contacted on her cell phone and heard the symptoms she said, “This is bad, Michaele. I’ll meet you at Fair Oaks Hospital.” Michaele took the long drive north to the familiar turf of Fairfax and was hooked up to an intravenous antibiotic drip. The middle aged female emergency room doctor on duty that night agreed Michaele should stay until the next morning, resting, before her hour long drive back home. At about 2 a.m., a young nurse poked her head in and was overheard by Michaele whispering something about “the White House Crasher” to several colleagues in the hall. They, in turn, gawked at the prone Michaele. Nurse Moseley said the woman brazenly looked at the chart and said, “Michaele Salahi … are you the one they’re talking about?” Michaele nodded her head yes.

Right after that Cynthia Moseley reports, “Things kind of shifted. They definitely thought ‘this is trouble—we don’t want her here.’ The lady doctor came back in and said, ‘O.K. you’re all done. Good-bye.’ I tried to tell the doctor, ‘She can’t drive home at 3 a.m. She still has an IV in! But the doctor said to me, ‘Can’t
you
take her home?’ It was so unethical.”

Michaele pulled herself out of bed, the doctor removed the IV and she drove herself to her mother’s home nearby to spend the rest of the night. Her brother, Howard, says, “Mom and I keep telling Missy she’s going to be 50 years old and in a wheelchair like Annette Funicello. Funicello couldn’t slow down either and look what happened. Missy just doesn’t listen.”

Friends and family members began to report back to the Salahis about visits from federal agents asking all sorts of questions about the couple. John Delmare who owns the beautiful Rappahannock Cellars Vineyard next door to Oasis says he got a visit from agents of the FBI and the U.S. Postal Service. “I think they were on a fishing expedition,” he said. “They were asking about a grant Tareq had gotten a while back to write a report on Virginia wine country.” Delmare confirmed for the agents that he knew all about the grant and the study Tareq had undertaken. “I told them the truth,” he said. “I told them it was the most comprehensive report ever done on the region and I had helped with it.” Delmare never heard another word from the agents. It left him wondering if his former neighbor wasn’t the target of some White House smear campaign instigated after the state dinner mess. If they thought Salahi had done something wrong with a grant years earlier, why were they just
now
coming around to ask questions?

Susan Dove reports she was also visited by two federal agents asking about her involvement with a suspect charity the Salahis founded, called Journey for the Cure. She was listed as its Treasurer. “I really didn’t have much involvement with the organization … It was actually a really stupid thing for me to allow myself to be named as treasurer without actually being involved. It is something that I will never do again.”

Dove was relieved that the agent’s questions were limited because her attorney had prepared her in an overly thorough way. He’d warned her that since Michaele was married later in life, and she herself was unmarried, the agents might ask if they were lovers or if there was some sort of intimate three-way relationship with Tareq. The answer to both questions was an emphatic “No!” She was learning that being friends with the Salahis was hard work and Dove was thankful those questions were never asked.

In early April 2010, a Strasburg, Virginia radio station broadcast a morning program called “Hot Wings and Beer” which ran what it thought was a hysterical commentary on the Salahis. The couple was called “boobs and idiots” for wanting to set the record straight. Tareq was called a “doughy putz” and a “prick” and Michaele “an airheaded whore wife.” The radio personality ended by wistfully saying, “Ahhh. So many fatal car accidents in the world you’d think maybe just once God would love us enough to put them in one!” When Rosemary Holt heard about it, she called the Shenandoah County Sheriff’s Office to file a report against the station. She was told it was a freedom of speech issue and she’d have to complain to the Federal Communications Commission. She decided not to bother.

Nearly every day there was a new revelation to contend with. The media continued to poke, pick and disgorge personal details about the couple—especially Michaele. She was scoffed at for her supposed claim of having won the Miss USA pageant. Reporters sought out Donald Trump himself, co-owner of the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants with NBC Universal, and he gladly growled into the TV cameras, “She couldn’t have been a former Miss USA if she’d tried … she just doesn’t have it!” No one bothered to dig up the fact that Michaele
had
entered the Pennsylvania chapter’s Miss USA contest in 1990.

Nothing seemed to garner more ridicule of Michaele than her stubborn assertion that she had been a Washington Redskin Cheerleader in the 1987-88 era. At that point in time she would have been four years out of high school and 22 years old.

In a town of politicians and political operatives, where pride can sometimes be a fleeting thing, this was a major point of discussion everyone seemed to focus upon. Was she or wasn’t she? Had she been part of that famous group of Redskinettes or hadn’t she?

In 1987, Joe Gibbs was the head coach, the season started with a player’s strike that lasted nearly a month, and the Redskins won their second championship in Super Bowl XXII against the Denver Broncos on January 31, 1988 in San Diego. In other words, it was one hell of a memorable season. Michaele, however, couldn’t remember the opposing team the Redskins played in the “one or two” games she said she had cheered in. And, it seemed curious that for a girl who had kept so many pictures of herself at various stages of life, she couldn’t come up with any of herself in an actual Redskins cheerleader outfit.

There were scads of photos of Michaele on the Redskins playing field sporting the team’s traditional red and gold pom-poms and wearing a uniform black sweat suit like the other women, but those had been taken later—in 2005 or so—when she participated during halftime shows with the Alumni cheerleading club.

After the night of the state dinner when the media began to read up on everything ever written about the couple, the Redskins claim stuck out as one that would be easy to confirm or prove wrong. Initial checks with the Redskins’ organization produced no definitive answer as to whether Michaele had ever been a cheerleader. Record keeping of the cheering squads had been spotty over the years. An initial check failed to turn up anyone with the name Michaele or Missy Holt, but the organization had to admit its records were not complete.

Terri Lamb, long time President of the Redskin Cheerleader’s Alumni Club was swamped with calls from the media and she contacted Michaele right away. “I told her if she could just give me a picture of herself in uniform, then the whole controversy could be put to rest. She promised me back in November (2009) that she would dig out pictures. I’m still waiting.” Lamb conducted her own internal investigation, surprised that someone who had had the honor of being a National Football League cheerleader wouldn’t have a framed picture of herself somewhere handy.