Real-life spy fooled George Bush and the Secret Service with a mask
A former spy has revealed how she managed to fool then-president George Bush and his Secret Service in 1990 with just a mask.
Jonna Mendez, former Chief of Disguise in the CIA’s Office of Technical Service, worked as a spy during the Cold War, and is now an author, lecturer, teacher and consultant on intelligence.
One of the most fascinating anecdotes from her 27-year career happened in 1990 during her time as Chief of Disguise, when she entered the White House wearing a full face mask and successfully fooled President George H.W. Bush and the Secret Service during a briefing.
The mask was far from the type you would buy at a store. It was an ultra-realistic, full face mask modeled after a female colleague named Becky.
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The meeting Mendez attended also included CIA Director William Webster and top officials like Brent Scowcroft and Bob Gates. The only person other than Mendez herself who knew she was wearing a mask, with hair attached, was CIA Director Webster - not even the Secret Service had an inkling at what was going on.
But how did the president discover Mendez was wearing a mask? The big reveal came after she built a rapport with the room, discussing the disguise program. Then, like a scene that sounds lifted from a thriller film, she revealed she was already wearing the new tech and removed the mask in seconds.
Mendez discussed the incredible moment during an interview with Mel Robbins which was shared on TikTok.
“I wore her face very nicely,” Mendez joked. “And I dropped 20 years in a heartbeat.”
President Bush had been president of the CIA at one point, Mendez shared, which makes the story and the big reveal even more enlightening.
“We had done some disguises for him. Mostly for entertainment,” she shared. “He wasn’t out on the streets doing work. But mostly, for a conference or something. He had a couple of disguises.”
During the briefing in which Mendez wore a disguise to show off the new tech, she recalled telling the president: “Well, I’m here today to show you the best new thing we’ve got. You’re going to love it.”
She added: “He’s behind the Resolute Desk and he’s saying. ‘Well, where is it?’ He’s looking. I said, ‘Well, I’m wearing it’”.
Mendez said she was going to ‘take it off and show it to you’, to which the president said, ‘No, no’.
He then proceeded to get up and walked around Mendez’s chair in search for the big reveal. But after failing to spot it, he sat back down.
After the president told Mendez to ‘take it off’, she took off her mask, doing the ‘Tom Cruise thing’ from the 1996 film Mission Impossible where he also takes off a realistic mask.
“Bush loved it. Everybody loved it. It’s a great new possibility.”
Mendez revealed that making a mask to look realistic wasn’t the hard part. It was making it move and ‘animate’ like a real human that proved difficult, until then.
Greg Harris