WASHINGTON — President Biden’s nearly 2-year-old German shepherd commander bit seven people in four months after former chief Major was ousted from the White House for similar aggressive behavior, according to internal Secret Service communications reviewed by The Post.
The shocking series of incidents involving the commander, none of which have been previously reported, mirrors attacks involving the commander, who the White House says was released to family friends after biting numerous Secret Service members in 2021.
In the most serious documented incident involving the commander, the White House Physician’s Office on November 3, 2022 referred a bitten uniformed Secret Service officer to a local hospital for treatment after the dog squeezed his arm and thigh, according to emails released under the Freedom of Information Act to the conservative legal group Judicial Watch.
Records show the commander broke the skin on the hand and arm of another Secret Service member weeks after the president locked him out of the White House after a family movie night, and the following month the commander bit into the back of a security technician at Biden’s home in Wilmington, Delaware.
The new First Family headache comes as House Republicans intensify their focus on Joe Biden’s role in his son Hunter and brother James Biden’s international business dealings in countries including Ukraine and China, with one of Hunter’s closest associates, Devon Archer, expected to testify next week that the first son often put his father, then vice president, on speakerphone when he was with his foreign associates.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the dog bites, after it was criticized for a lack of transparency for covering up incidents involving former Chief Major.
The documented attacks from September 2022 through January are likely an undercount of incidents involving the commander, as the time period does not cover his first nine months in the White House or the most recent six-month time window.
“These shocking files raise fundamental questions about President Biden and the Secret Service,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
“This is a particular type of insanity and corruption where a president would allow his dog to repeatedly attack and bite Secret Service and White House personnel. And instead of protecting its agents, the Secret Service attempted to illegally hide documents of abuse of its agents and officers by the Biden family,” Fitton added.
Biden, 80, reportedly expressed doubt about the honesty of a Secret Service member who said his former dog Major, also a German shepherd, bit him on the leg, and the White House has not disclosed any biting incidents involving the major, who can often be heard barking on the grounds of the executive mansion.
Behind the scenes, officers described a series of alarming incidents.
The most serious incident, on November 3, began when a Secret Service officer was sitting at the bottom of a White House staircase.
The commander “came downstairs and walked toward” them, according to an internal agency email.
The dog, without provocation, allegedly bit the officer’s arm in the triceps and, as the officer stood up, bit the quadriceps area of his leg.
Another officer reported that the victim of the attack reported “considerable pain” and said she was forced to use a steel cart to protect herself from further attacks.
An officer with the Secret Service Joint Operations Center wrote: “WH Medical treated the officer and made the decision to transport (the victim) to the (redacted) hospital.”
Two days after the incident, the assaulted officer, whose doctor placed them on restricted duty for three days after their hospital visit, emailed a colleague who inquired about their recovery: “My leg and arm still hurt. He bit me twice and ran me twice.
The Secret Service member responded: “What a joke… if it wasn’t for your dog, he would have been shot by now: the creepy clown needs a muzzle.”
Some of the incidents directly involved the First Family, according to the email cache.
On November 10, a Division officer in a Secret Service uniform was bitten on the left thigh by the commander while First Lady Jill Biden was walking the dog in Kennedy Garden near the East Wing and reported “bruising, tenderness, and pain in the area of the bite,” a communication in the production of the document reveals.
On November 14, another Secret Service agent described in an emailed report that he had to defend himself with a chair to avoid being attacked.
The officer wrote that they “heard the dog barking a loud, aggressive noise” and “looked up and saw it on the landing of the bailiffs’ stairwell. I made eye contact with him and grabbed the black chair he was sitting in and held it in front of me as I backed away.
On December 11, a Secret Service special agent in the Presidential Protection Division said he was bitten after the president removed the commander’s leash after watching a movie, writing that he had a 1.5-cm (half-inch) cut and bruise on the agent’s arm and a 1-cm (0.4-inch) cut from a second bite on his hand and thumb.
One of the agent’s bosses wrote in an email also disclosed to Judicial Watch that “it happened after the family cinema left” with “commander and relatives (total 6 attendees).”
President Biden “asked to take the (tied) commander to the Kennedy Garden. Once in the KG, POTUS removed Commander’s leash to run free. I was present to observe (deleted) leave the Kennedy Garden to move behind (deleted) into the south corridor through the inner garden gate when (the attack) occurred.
A work injury form shows that a Secret Service agent was also bitten on December 16.
“I was walking through the compound and a dog bit my left arm,” the officer wrote, describing the injury as a “dog bite, superficial laceration, contusion, pain, and bruise.”
On Christmas Eve, a Secret Service inspector wrote to his colleagues that a day earlier, another officer “was bitten yesterday while stationed at (redacted location).”
“Almost all of the officials in the room with me today spoke about specific incidents involving the First Family dog,” the inspector’s email read.
On January 2, an agency security technical investigator was attacked while investigating an alarm at the president’s home in Wilmington, where he often spends weekends.
“The commander pushed his way through the door and immediately bit/blocked me on the lower right side of my back,” the attack victim wrote in an email.
A person whose name was redacted from the email “told the commander to come down and helped get him out,” the technician wrote.
“The total incident did not last more than about 10 seconds and the commander re-entered the residence. (Name redacted) apologized after the incident. After checking my lower back there is a 1×1 scraped and bruised spot where the major grabbed me and it was bleeding from a scratch like a carpet burn.
The incidents appeared to start in October of last year.
In the first documented case, on the morning of October 5, the commander “jumped” on an emergency response technician on the White House grounds and bit his “arm/wrist area.”
On October 3, at a door leading to the garden near the east wing, the major “inflicted a ‘friendly soft bite’ on the forearm (of a Secret Service agent) while holding the door open”, although “the bite did not break the skin”.
On October 26, a uniformed Division Secret Service officer wrote: “The commander displayed extremely aggressive behavior. Today, when he was assigned, he came to collect me. The First Lady was unable to regain control of the commander (sic) and she kept circling me. I think it’s only a matter of time before an agent/officer is attacked or bitten.
“He would have bitten me today if I hadn’t approached him several times. It was bad enough that the retail agent asked me if I’d been bitten, just so you know.
