By Marc Ambinder:
Donald Trump is a creature of New York. He ran against Washington and called it “a swamp.” During his campaign, he often flew home late at night so he could wake up in his own bed. His 10-year-old son is enrolled in a Manhattan private school. So it’s no wonder Trump is reportedly considering spending time in New York whenever he is able — presumably on weekends.
If so, his home, in the penthouse of Trump Tower, on E. 56th Street and Fifth Avenue, will be the epicenter of an iron curtain that will wall off much of Midtown from the rest of the city. Creating a permanent, sterile environment inside a 58-story, multi-occupancy building on one of the busiest streets in one of the busiest cities in the world poses an unprecedented challenge for the Secret Service and the military.
No city on Earth is better prepared to host a presidential visit than New York: The police department works seamlessly with the Secret Service these days, and Manhattanites are used to traffic jams. But to accommodate a more regular presidential presence, the daily routines of ordinary New Yorkers who live in, work near or commute through a five- to 10-block radius of Trump Tower will change. They will not be able to move freely; sometimes they won’t be able to move at all. Whenever a president moves, everything nearby freezes.
This past week, the Secret Service and the NYPD began to draw up a security blueprint to protect the soon-to-be-president while minimizing disruption. (Secret Service spokesman Marty Mulholland declined to comment for this story, citing the agency’s policy of not talking about protective operations.) But shielding Trump from harm is only one of many objectives. Ensuring that he can communicate with the military, world leaders, Congress and the American people at all times is just as vital, and these goals exponentially increase the number of people, objects and systems that surround a modern president.
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