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Showing Original Post only (View all)Obama signs law giving himself, Bush, Others lifetime Secret Service guard. [View all]
Former presidents have to give up rides on Air Force One. But now they don't have to give up being shadowed by the armed-and-earpieced bodyguards of the Secret Service.
President Barack Obama on Thursday signed into a law a measure giving him, George W. Bush and future former presidents and their spouses lifetime Secret Service protection, the White House announced.
The legislation, crafted by Republican Rep. Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, rolls back a mid-1990s law that imposed a 10-year limit on Secret Service protection for former presidents. Bush would have been the first former commander in chief affected.
At the time, lawmakers who supported the measure said it would save the government millions of dollars. They also argued that former presidents could hire private security firms (as Richard Nixon did after he decided to forgo Secret Service protection in 1985).
The rest: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/obama-signs-law-giving-himself-bush-lifetime-secret-184305122--politics.html