I saw the article (linked below) which claims that Reps Matt Gaetz and Lauren Boebert ignored a capitol security checkpoint and entered the House floor to see the speech by Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky.
The article notes that doing things like this may result in a fine from the House ethics committee (which republicans will control soon).
I am thinking if I tried such a thing I would be tackled or shot but, clearly, security let Gaetz and Boebert through with little fuss.
My question: Is it illegal to prevent a representative from attending a session of congress? Is capitol security, in the end, unable to stop any representative from entering who skips a security screening? I have a vague memory that police cannot stop a representative who is headed to a session of congress.
They can have guns in other areas but not on the floor of the House or the Senate. Boebert has been stopped from entering before but there is not a lot of information about the how the incident was resolved.
The Capitol Police should have stopped them but I’m sure they did not want to make a scene at this historic speech. And those two performative assholes probably would have loved it if they had. It’s not a good look for them or the police but Republicans won’t do shit about it.
If the article is to be believed (and it seems straightforward enough) the capitol police made some effort and Boebert and Gaetz kept going and capitol police did nothing.
Presumably the House ethics committee might take this up and issue a fine but, it seems likely control of the House will switch before that committee would meet to decide if a fine is appropriate. I’ll leave it at that since this is FQ.
Depends on how you define “representative”. Congress has an absolute right to determine the qualifications of its members, and has sometimes invoked this right to provisionally or permanently deny the right of elected or appointed members to sit. For instance, when Roland Burris was appointed senator of Illinois in 2009, the senate refused to recognize the legitimacy of his appointment, and he was physically prevented from entering the senate chamber when he showed up for the swearing-in. Burris was eventually admitted, about a week later, after resolving the bureaucratic issues surrounding his appointment. In a much earlier case, that of Reed Smoot (1903), there was no question about the legitimacy of his election, but the senate simply didn’t like his character, and so they delayed seating him for four years. (I’m not sure whether Smoot ever tried to actually physically enter the senate chamber, but if so, it’s a good bet that he too would have been barred.)
If so, this protection may have been inherited from English law. In 1512, an English MP by the name of Richard Strode planned to travel to Parliament to introduce a bill to protect tin miners. A local mine owner, hearing of these plans, contrived to have the local authorities swiftly prosecute, convict, and imprison Strode on charges of obstructing the local industry. In response, Parliament passed an act that protected MPs from being prosecuted for planned or completed parliamentary activities, thus helping to ensure their freedom of movement on official business.
The Capitol Police officers work for Congress. I’m not sure how the privilege works when the arresting officers work for the very same body the privilege is intended to protect. By tradition, members of Congress did not have to stop for security screenings before some Congress critters started pushing boundaries a bit too much and Congress changed its rules. The question now is whether Congress wants to apply its rules.
Under the Constitution, members of Congress “shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony, and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their attendance at the Session of their Respective Houses, and in going to and from the same.”
That’s obviously a potentially pretty broad exception (although I don’t know if skipping a security checkpoint is a felony or constitutes breach of peace). There have been a number of recent examples of members of Congress skipping security checkpoints, and it seems to be accepted that the remedy is a fine by the ethics office. But I don’t know the legal/regulatory authority/parameters for the checkpoints.
(For example, some years ago, a member of Congress assaulted a Capitol Police officer when he challenged her for evading security and while she was investigated (and not indicted) for the assault, it was accepted that, under the rules at the time, members of Congress weren’t required to go through the checkpoint at all; the issue was about whether the Capitol Police officer should have known that’s who she was).
If I recall the case, she claimed he assumed she was not a congressmember because she was female and black. But also, she was not wearing the congress lapel pin that would have identified her to the CP. Since then it apparently established that congressmembers do not have to line up and go through checkpoints and metal detectors.
IIRC there was a commotion a few years ago about grandstanding members who bypassed security to bring live phones into a secured hearing where such things weren’t allowed due to classified material being discussed. You’d think elected officials would have proper respect for the need to safeguard classified materials.