Teen reporter meets president

ST. LOUIS -- Alex Hagen is ready to let bygones be bygones.

In January, the 14-year-old journalist was ridiculed and sent away by Secret Service agents when he tried to cover President Bush's visit for his local newspaper. On Monday, the president offered the eighth-grader an apology -- and threw in a personal tour of Air Force One for good measure.

When Bush stepped down from the plane, the Webster County Citizen's cub reporter was among the first in line to greet him.

"He's like, 'I heard about what happened and I'm sorry,' and I'm like, 'Don't worry about that,"' Hagen said. "He said to make it up to me, he'd let me go on Air Force One."

So he did. Hagen got a full tour of the plane, and found the rooms in there to be bigger than he expected.

"There are about 75 phones in the whole thing," Hagen said. He even sat in the president's chair: "It was electronic."

January incident

Hagen, an eighth-grader from Seymour, is the Citizen's school reporter. He's written more than 100 stories for the paper on high school sports and general news. When Bush visited Aurora in January, editor Dan Wehmer was short-staffed and sent Hagen to cover the event.

"It was kind of my duty for my whole town to do it," Hagen said.

Driven by his mother, Hagen went to Aurora with a bona fide Missouri Press Association press pass and a letter of introduction -- more than grown-up reporters usually have. The letter also included a telephone number to contact Wehmer if there were any questions.

Instead, the Secret Service told him to go away, as agents and reporters entering the event had a laugh at his expense. He came back a few minutes later to ask the reason he was kept out. They gave him no reason, and again told him to leave.

After Hagen's misadventure, sympathetic reporters at KYTV-TV in Springfield, Mo., saw what happened and talked to him. The story got local then national attention. It also got the attention of Republican former congressman and Senate candidate Jim Talent, who called Hagen the next day.

Talent promised to help him meet the president, who visied St. Louis on Monday to raise money for Talent's Senate campaign. Talent is the Republican nominee to face Sen. Jean Carnahan, who was appointed to the seat.

Hagen wasn't too concerned with objectivity Monday -- "I told him he's doing a great job as president." -- but afterward he sounded like a journalist nonetheless. "I'm going to write about this as soon as I get home," he said.

Associated Press Writer Jim Suhr in St. Louis contributed to this report.