aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South
Monday, May 02, 2005
It’s a sign
Renee Jenkins of Elkins, West Virginia had anti-Bush/Cheney signs in her yard:
“I was actually taking a nap, and there was a knock on my door, there was a West Virginia State Trooper and a Secret Service agent,” she says, identifying them as Trooper R. J. Boggs and Agent James Lanham. “They asked to come in. And I let them. And they started interviewing me.”
Jensen, who at the time was running for city council, asked why they were there.
“Apparently someone had made a statement that I’d been canvassing door to door and had said I wanted to cut President Bush’s head off,” she says. “I told Agent Lanham that I was running for city council, but I hadn’t started my door-to-door campaign yet and I never had said anything like that.”
This didn’t satisfy them, though.
“They conducted an extensive interview about my background, my family, and any political organizations I belonged to,” she says. “I told them I belong to the ACLU and that’s about it.”
They continued to pry, she says.
Agent Lanham “asked me several times to sign a form about releasing my medical records, and I refused,” she says. “That was kind of annoying. And he asked to search my house. He didn’t have a search warrant, but I said go ahead. And they took some pictures of me and some pictures of my signs.”
Before they left, she says, “I had to sign a statement that I never threatened the PresidentÃÂs life.”
