Department of Homeland Security (DHS) secretary Janet Napolitano met House Homeland Security Committee chairman Rep. Peter King, New York Republican, for dinner Wednesday evening at Bobby Van’s Steakhouse in downtown Washington, D.C.
King spokesman Kevin Fogarty told The Daily Caller it was a “friendly, social conversation” that “lasted about three hours.” DHS spokesman Matt Chandler told TheDC, though, that the discussion was work-related. “News alert, it still happens in Washington: A discussion between the secretary of homeland security and the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee on matters germane to the Department and the Committee,” Chandler said in an email.
When TheDC asked Fogarty if there was discussion about Homeland Security issues, Fogarty said the dinner was, in general, “just a general discussion.”
A Republican source, who was in the restaurant with friends that night, told TheDC they didn’t have any papers on the table and looked “chummy.” He said it looked much more like a social meeting than a work meeting, as Chandler suggests.
Neither Fogarty nor Chandler would tell TheDC specifically what King and Napolitano were talking about.