A power outage hit the White House and much of the Washington area on Tuesday, snarling trains, emptying museums and cutting electricity to government buildings and the U.S. Capitol.
The Justice Department and State Department were also affected, along with the University of Maryland. Power company Pepco Holdings Inc. said the outage stemmed from a dip in voltage because of transmission line trouble.
Power was briefly knocked out to the White House, delaying the daily press briefing.