WASHINGTON (AP) — Police have arrested a Missouri man they believe intentionally crashed a U-Haul truck into a security barrier at a park across from the White House.
The box truck’s driver smashed into the barrier near the north side of Lafayette Square on Monday at around 10 p.m., Secret Service spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said in a statement. He was identified as 19-year-old Sai Varshith Kandula, of Chesterfield, a St. Louis suburb.
No one was injured in the crash.
A witness, Chris Zaboji, said the driver smashed into the barrier at least twice. Zaboji, a 25-year-old pilot who lives in Washington, was finishing a run close by Lafayette Square when he heard the loud crash of the U-Haul truck hitting the barrier. He said he took out his phone and captured the moment the truck struck the barrier again before he heard sirens approaching.
“When the van backed up and rammed it again, I decided I wanted to get out of there,” he said.
Officers from the Secret Service and the Metropolitan Police Department searched the truck after the crash. Video posted by WUSA-TV shows a police officer at the scene picking up and inventorying several pieces of evidence from the truck, including a Nazi flag.
Based on a preliminary investigation, investigators believe the driver “may have intentionally struck the security barriers at Lafayette Square,” Guglielmi said. Authorities offered no additional details about the possible motive.
The U.S. Park Police said Kandula was arrested on multiple charges, including threatening to kill, kidnap or inflict harm on a president, vice president or member of their family; assault with a dangerous weapon; reckless driving; destruction of federal property; and trespassing.
No attorney was listed for Kandula in court records, multiple telephone numbers listed under his surname in public records were out of service, and efforts by The Associated Press to reach relatives who could speak on his behalf on Tuesday were not immediately successful.
Lafayette Square, which offers perhaps the best view of the White House available to the public, has long been one of the nation’s most prominent venues for demonstrations. The park was closed for nearly a year after federal authorities fenced off the area at the height of nationwide protests over policing following the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, but it reopened in May 2021.
U-Haul is a moving truck, trailer and self-storage rental company based in Phoenix.
This is the ultimate fake news, The authorities took a nazi flag from their own car to blame it on this guy in order to drum up a non existent “white supremacy” epidemic to hammer Republicans.
The driver was in all probability a guy with mental health issues who rented a UHaul because he was too young to rent a car. UHaul rents to 18 year olds.
Chesterfield is a suburb with a significant Jewish population and a Yeshiva
This REEKS of a false flag op . Literally
this has got to be the biggest fake false flag pile of trash I have seen in months! really? A random guy just happens to bump into the barriers of the WH at low speed, without anything but some duct tape and a brand new Nazi flag? the PD puts out the brand new crispy Nazi flag on the ground along with the duct tape for a photo op? Really? Open your eyes sheeple, you’re being manipulated here!
The Nazi flag was added so law enforcement officials & politicians would have their phones tied up by Yidden demanding it be labeled “Antisemitism”
450,000 Americans were killed defeating the nazis, fascist Italy and Japan. 500,000 Jewish soldiers fought in USA Armed Forces in WW2. Defeating rightist nazis today like the “oath keepers” and “proud boys” is still our mission as Yidden.