Secret Service Breaks Up White House Childhood Cancer Vigil

Hundreds of parents and their children who are sick, battling cancer were ordered to leave Lafayette Square Park in Washington, D.C., Saturday evening.

The parents and children gathered at Lafayette Park Saturday night for a scheduled candlelight vigil to call attention to childhood cancer and push for increased funding for cancer research, according to The Washington Post.

Secret Service agents kicked out the attendees twice during the event because President Barack Obama was traveling to and from the White House. He additionally offered to visit one of their meetings to apologize in person, and to bring some of the children to tour training facilities in Maryland.

Such park closures are frequent and also affect the pedestrian area outside the White House. “He said they were going to internally look into what went on, but he said they did not handle it well, and he felt really bad about it”, said Gillette.

Requests for comment from the Secret Service and CureFest were not immediately returned.

President Obama was attending the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s annual gala and chose to exit the White House property through a door close to park, reports Twitchy.

“At first, we were patient. We’re just a bunch of families who care about kids with cancer”. “But after about an hour, or hour and a half, it started getting a little angry, some of the fathers”. Others read into it signs of a White House snub of their cause.

“I feel like this may be overcompensating for glaring errors that the Secret Service has made in past years”. “We never thought there was any malice intended”. “When we get shut out of the president’s front yard, it’s just disheartening”. So they chose to hold a candlelight vigil of their own.

Some have said the agency’s actions may have been a response to a number of cases over the last few years that, as The Christian Science Monitor previously reported, have called to question its ability to both protect the first family and behave judiciously while on duty.

Last year, Congress launched an investigation of the Secret Service following a series of security breaches and scandals, including several fence-jumping incidents.