Washington, July 17 (Prensa Latina) A series of violent threats against members of the US Congress has caused deep concern about the risk to the security of some political figures amid an increasingly polarized national environment.
One of the most recent incidents occurred less than a week ago when a person was arrested for allegedly threatening to kill a tail. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), who heads the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
According to law enforcement, officers arrested the suspect on the street outside Jayapal’s home in Seattle on the night of July 9 with a gun in his waistband.
A neighbor told police he heard the man yelling, “Go back to India, I’ll kill you,” and saw the suspect’s vehicle pass Jayapal’s residence about three times as he yelled foul language.
The suspect (48) was released on Wednesday after police were unable to prove the truth of the alleged intimidation, the Seattle Times reported.
In early July, Rep. Adam Kinzinger III, one of two Republicans serving on the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, shared letters and voicemail threats sent to him. “I hope you die naturally as soon as possible.” “This weekend we will protest in front of your house. We know who your family is and we will kill you” and “We will take your wife and children.”
The storming of the Capitol, considered an attempted coup, reminds citizens that the United States is not immune to the kind of political violence that is relatively common in some parts of the world, according to The Hill newspaper.
Kinzinger posted a video on his Twitter account compiling the disturbing communication and wrote that threats of violence have risen sharply in recent years.
Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon (D-Penn), on the other hand, attributed this new trend not only to former President Donald Trump, who was well known for promoting violence at his rallies and continues to promote lies about the 2020 election. She also links the trend to congressional Republicans continuing to defend the former president and his actions regarding the January 6, 2020, uprising.
“Everybody gets threats these days, and it’s made worse by the fact that some of our members don’t condemn political violence, especially when it comes to the Capitol, the Vice President and the Speaker of the House,” she warned.
“I just arrived in 2018, and the threats were always related to the former president,” she added. “Certainly, we’ve seen a hardening of the public dialogue, a willingness to launch baseless accusations that Trump has supported,” she said, commenting that this was the model of behavior the former president set as a (bad) example for the country.
