A couple of weeks ago, a reader asked whether a military aide still acompanies the President carrying the “nuclear football”—otherwise known as the presiden’t emergency satchel.
I said that I assumed so, but that I hadn’t seen anything in a while and would keep an eye out.
The last article I saw was from early 2005.
Well, we have confirmation, according to a White House staff schedule for the President’s trip to Florida, which a sanitation worker found in the trash.
The schedule includes a list of “every passenger on board each aircraft, from the President to military attaché with nuclear football.”
Wikipedia has a nice entry on the nuclear football, if you are interested.
From the USAToday article…Reagan aides joking around with football handler? Terrific!
“Former military aide Peter Metzger recalls that once Reagan aide Mike Deaver steered him into a different elevator from the president and fooled him into thinking he had missed the motorcade. Metzger said his heart was racing “like a gerbil in a cage” until he realized it was a ruse.”