Richard Levin

Jenna Bush and Barbara Bush, President Bush’s 19-year-old twin daughters, arrive at “secure locations,” where they have been brought by their Secret Service agents. Barbara Bush, a student at Yale University, is taken to the Secret Service’s New Haven, Connecticut, office; Jenna Bush, a student at the University of Texas, is taken to a room at the Driskill Hotel in Austin. [Us Weekly, 10/15/2001; Woodward, 2002, pp. 17; Dish Magazine, 4/1/2002; Draper, 2007, pp. 141]
President’s Daughters Asleep When Attacks Began – Jenna Bush was asleep in her dormitory room at the University of Texas when the terrorist attacks began, and learned of the catastrophic events when a Secret Service agent knocked on her door a few minutes after 9:00 a.m. Barbara Bush was also asleep when the attacks began, in her dormitory room at Yale. She heard what was happening on her clock radio, when the alarm woke her up at 9:00 a.m. “I found out the same way everybody else did,” she will later recall. “At first, we thought it was just an accident,” she will say. “Then, next door, there was another student sobbing, and that’s how we found out.” [Andersen, 2002, pp. 6; Bush, 2010, pp. 202; Winnipeg Free Press, 6/5/2010]
Concern that Bush Daughter’s Presence Makes University a Target – There was concern that Barbara Bush’s presence at Yale could make the university a possible target for terrorists. Richard Levin, the university president, will say, “Our first concern was actually that Yale could potentially be a target because of President Bush’s daughter.” Therefore, he will say, “The first thing we did [in response to the attacks] was call the Secret Service.” He will add, “By the time we got in touch with the Secret Service, she was already evacuated from Yale.” [Yale Daily News, 9/9/2011] However, Barbara Bush is only “relocated” to the Secret Service’s New Haven office at 10:51 a.m., according to Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward. And Jenna Bush is only relocated to the Driskill Hotel minutes later, at 10:57 a.m. [Woodward, 2002, pp. 17]
Secret Service Must Keep President’s Daughters ‘out of Harm’s Way’ – As the president’s daughters are considered to be among the nation’s “most visible targets,” the Secret Service is responsible for protecting them. [US Department of the Treasury, 5/8/2001; Office of Management and Budget, 7/2001, pp. 82 ; United States Secret Service, 2002] The agency’s mission includes keeping the president’s children “in sight and out of harm’s way,” according to a book about the Secret Service by author Philip Melanson. [Melanson, 2002, pp. 273]