Lawmaker: Protect presidential hopefuls

All presidential candidates still in the race should have Secret Service protection because their diversity and the media attention they attract present terrorists "a potent, high-profile target to make a statement," a House chairman wrote Wednesday to Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff.

"We must be better prepared," House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie G. Thompson wrote Chertoff in a letter copied to Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan.

Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, who are vying for their party's nomination, already have Secret Service protection. Obama was placed under protection in May, the earliest ever for a presidential candidate, at his own request after the urging of fellow Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin and others.

Clinton has a Secret Service detail provided to all former first ladies.

Presidential candidates can receive Secret Service protection when a committee consisting of the homeland security secretary and congressional leaders determines that a White House hopeful qualifies as a "major candidate."

With no clear front-runner for either party's nomination after two nominating contests, the remaining candidates competing in the primaries and caucuses should receive protection, Thompson wrote, invoking the assassinations of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and 1968 presidential candidate Robert Kennedy.

"Although I am confident that the U.S. Secret Service is doing everything it can to address and avert any and all threats against every candidate, I remain concerned that the enormity of the 2008 election provides a terrorist - domestic or foreign - with a potent, high-profile target to make a statement.," wrote Thompson, D-Miss.

Homeland Security Department spokesman Russ Knocke said, "We appreciate the chairman's continued interest in the matter."

He said the secretary consults with the Congressional Advisory Committee — which includes the speaker of the House and the minority leader, the majority and minority leader of the Senate, and a fifth member selected at large — prior to authorizing Secret Service protection for a presidential candidate. He noted such protection is only considered after a campaign makes a request for it.

Knocke said he could not comment on such deliberations.

"For security reasons the Secret Service does not disclose the timing, scope or details of its protective operations," he said. "There continues to be no credible information telling us of an imminent threat to the homeland or the elections, at this time."

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Associated Press writer Eileen Sullivan contributed to this story.

(This version CORRECTS makeup of committee in paragraph 9 to say a fifth member selected at large.)