Secret Service Bosses Shared Racist Jokes

Secret Service supervisors exchanged racist remarks in emails made public yesterday in a lawsuit filed by black agents, the New York Times reports. The messages were shared between at least 20 top agents between 2003 and 2005. One anecdote jokes about assassinating Jesse Jackson. And, according to the lawsuit, the head of the Presidential Protective Detail sent a crude joke about interracial sex to a colleague.

A lawyer for the black agents, whose long-running lawsuit charges that they were unfairly denied promotion, said they were "shocked but not surprised" by the evidence of racism high up in the service. Last month, a noose was found hanging in a room used by a black instructor at a Secret Service training center.   (More racist stories.)