Third crasher too rubbed shoulders with the powerful

WASHINGTON - The “third crasher” may not have got any close to President Barack Obama or his guest Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, but new photos reveal that Carlos Allen posed for pictures with many powerful people.

Like the first crasher couple, Tareq and Michaele Salahi, Allen, also posed for plenty of grip-and-grin shots at the state dinner, which were posted on Facebook late Monday by stylist Erwin Gomez. Michaele Salahi visited Gomez’s Georgetown salon to prep for the Nov 24 evening.

It appears that Allen was able to get close to some of the nation’s most elite politicians and media figures at the event, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Louisiana’s Indian American Governor Bobby Jindal, CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria and author Deepak Chopra.

In other pictures, Allen is standing next to former Secretary of State Colin Powell, Attorney General Eric Holder, senior presidential adviser David Axelrod, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry and House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers.

Other big names in the shots: White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, economic adviser Larry Summers, NBC news anchor Brian Williams, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Obama’s personal assistant Reggie Love, and longtime Washington power player Vernon Jordan.

There’s no immediate indication that Allen knew any of the people he posed with before meeting them at the dinner, the Politico, a media outlet focusing on politics said.

It quoted Allen’s lawyer, A. Scott Bolden, as saying, “The pictures are further evidence that Allen attended the dinner; was invited and treated as an invited guest and that he attended on behalf of Hush to interview guests and took several pictures with some very significant people - perhaps embarrassing to the Secret Service and White House, but not to Carlos Allen and the mission of the magazine.”

It’s not clear who took the photos inside the White House event. His attorney has said Allen attended the event alone.

Packard-Gomez who appeared before a federal grand jury Tuesday to tell the government what he knows about the event told the Politico, “As CEO of Erwin Gomez Salon, our first mission is to protect guest privacy.”

“However, when you are called by the White House, you have a legal responsibility to national security,” he said

adding, “We feel the naked truth will set you free.”

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)