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Tag: capitol insurrection

  • Colorado Judge Finds Trump Engaged In Insurrection, But Rejects Constitutional Ballot Challenge

    Colorado Judge Finds Trump Engaged In Insurrection, But Rejects Constitutional Ballot Challenge

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    DENVER (AP) — A Colorado judge on Friday found that former President Donald Trump engaged in insurrection during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol but rejected an effort to keep him off the state’s primary ballot because it’s unclear whether a Civil War-era Constitutional amendment barring insurrectionists from public office applies to the presidency.

    The lawsuit, brought by a left-leaning group on behalf of a group of Republican and independent Colorado voters, contended that Trump’s actions related to the attack ran afoul of a clause in the 14th Amendment that prevents anyone from holding office who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the Constitution.

    The decision by District Judge Sarah B. Wallace is the third ruling in a little over a week against lawsuits seeking to knock Trump off the ballot by citing Section 3 of the amendment. The Minnesota Supreme Court last week said Trump could remain on the primary ballot because political parties have sole choice over who appears, while a Michigan judge ruled that Congress is the proper forum for deciding whether Section 3 applies to Trump.

    In her decision, Wallace said she found that Trump did in fact “engage in insurrection” on Jan. 6 and rejected his attorneys’ arguments that he was simply engaging in free speech. Normally, that would be enough to disqualify him under Section 3, but she said she couldn’t do so for a presidential candidate.

    Section 3 does not specifically refer to the presidency, as it does members of the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives. Instead, the clause refers to “elector of President and Vice President,” along with civil and military offices.

    “Part of the Court’s decision is its reluctance to embrace an interpretation which would disqualify a presidential candidate without a clear, unmistakable indication that such is the intent of Section Three,” the judge wrote in the 102-page ruling.

    Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung called the ruling “another nail in the coffin of the un-American ballot challenges.”

    “These cases represent the most cynical and blatant political attempts to interfere with the upcoming presidential election by desperate Democrats,” Cheung said in a statement.

    Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, the group that filed the case, said they would appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court.

    “The Court found that Donald Trump engaged in insurrection after a careful and thorough review of the evidence,” said attorney Mario Nicolais, who was representing the voters who brought the lawsuit. “We are very pleased with the opinion and look forward to addressing the sole legal issue on appeal, namely whether Section 3 of the 14th Amendment applies to insurrectionist presidents.”

    Whether it’s the Colorado case or one filed in another state, the question ultimately is likely to reach the U.S. Supreme Court, which has never ruled on Section 3. The group suing in the Michigan case, Free Speech for People, filed an appeal Thursday in state court.

    Legal experts said it was significant that Wallace found Trump had engaged in insurrection. She wrote that she agreed with the petitioners’ claim that he “incited” the attack.

    “It’s a stunning holding for a court to conclude that a former president engaged in insurrection against the United States,” said Derek Muller, a Notre Dame law professor who has followed the case closely. “And there’s a good chance that, on appeal, a court bars him from the ballot.”

    Trump has called the attempt to remove “election interference” funded by “dark money” Democratic groups. His attorneys argued in court that Trump was simply engaging in his First Amendment rights on Jan. 6, that he did not incite an insurrection and that Section 3 was never meant to apply to presidential candidates.

    They also contended that no single judge should end a candidacy based on an interpretation of a clause that has been used only a handful of times in 150 years.

    “The petitioners are asking this court to do something that’s never been done in the history of the United States,” Trump attorney Scott Gessler said during closing arguments. “The evidence doesn’t come close to allowing the court to do it.”

    The petitioners argued that there is little ambiguity in Section 3, which was mainly used before Jan. 6 to prevent former Confederates from taking control of the government after the Civil War. It prohibits those who swore an oath to uphold the Constitution and then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same” from holding state or federal office, unless granted amnesty by a two-thirds vote of Congress.

    During a weeklong hearing earlier this month, they called a law professor who testified that the clause was widely understood to bar former Confederates from becoming president. He also showed post-Civil War documents indicating that even an act such as buying Confederate war bonds could make someone ineligible for office.

    The attorneys seeking to knock Trump off the ballot contended he was simply disqualified, as plainly as if he failed to meet the 35-year age limit for the office. That this had never happened before was a reflection, they said, on Trump and his actions.

    Legal historians say Section 3 fell into disuse after Congress granted an amnesty from its provisions to most former Confederates in 1872. It was revived after the attack on the Capitol, which was intended to stop Congress’ certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s win.

    The case turned on 150-year-old records from the debate over the 14th Amendment. Wallace said there is “scant direct evidence” that the measure was intended to apply to the presidency. She noted that Trump attorneys flagged a finding by one law professor that an early draft specified the presidency and vice presidency, but the final version did not. The provision also refers to “officers of the United States,” a phrase that elsewhere in the Constitution does not include the top two offices.

    But the petitioners’ legal historian testified that in the years after the Civil War it was widely understood that Section 3 would prevent Jefferson Davis, the former president of the Confederacy, from being elected president of the United States. He also unearthed records from the debate in which one senator asked if the measure applied to the presidency and an author read back the “officers of the United States” language. The senator who asked the question was then convinced that it did, indeed, include the president, according to the testimony.

    “The record demonstrates an appreciable amount of tension between the competing interpretations, and a lack of definitive guidance in the text or historical sources,” Wallace wrote.

    The recent cases against Trump mark a new flurry of interest in the long-ignored provision that only started to gain attention after Jan. 6.

    The group that filed the Minnesota and Michigan challenges, Free Speech For People, also tried to remove Republican Reps. Madison Cawthorn and Marjorie Taylor Greene from the ballot in 2022 by citing Section 3. Cawthorn’s case became moot when he lost his primary, and a judge ruled against the lawsuit seeking to oust Greene.

    CREW successfully used Section 3 to remove a rural New Mexico County Commissioner who entered the Capitol on Jan. 6 and was later convicted of a misdemeanor.

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  • Kevin McCarthy’s Brief Speakership Meets Its End

    Kevin McCarthy’s Brief Speakership Meets Its End

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    Kevin McCarthy began his 269th day as House speaker by recounting all the times he proved his doubters wrong. In January, after a series of humiliating defeats, the California Republican hung on to become speaker of the House. In the months since, he reminisced, he has narrowly averted the twin crises of a national-debt default and, this past weekend, a government shutdown. “I just don’t give up,” McCarthy told reporters after making one more plea to his party to keep him in his post.

    Today, McCarthy’s streak of defying his skeptics came to an end as a group of his GOP critics joined Democrats to vote him out of the speakership after fewer than nine months in office. The unprecedented move could paralyze the House for days or even weeks, as Congress faces a November 17 deadline for funding the federal government.

    Whether McCarthy is done for good as speaker remains unclear. The vote to remove him will trigger a new election, and McCarthy was coy with reporters earlier in the day about whether he’d try to reclaim the gavel. Assuming he doesn’t, his tenure atop the House—the briefest in nearly 150 years—was as historic as it was short-lived: He won the office after fighting through more ballots than any speaker in a century, and he was the first to be removed in the middle of a term by a vote of the House.

    Few of McCarthy’s 54 predecessors had assumed the speakership with lower expectations. His years rising through the GOP leadership had left him with a reputation as a glad-handing lightweight with few convictions. And his majority seemed ungovernable from the start. He had just a five-vote margin over the Democrats, and was surrounded by hard-liners who demanded confrontation over compromise. McCarthy traded away much of his power as speaker during the marathon series of votes that ended, after 15 rounds, with his election. As part of the horse trade, McCarthy handed his Republican foes the means of his own destruction: the ability for a single member to call, at any time, a vote on whether to remove the speaker.

    “From day one, he knew and everyone knew that he was living on borrowed time,” Representative Gerry Connolly of Virginia told me recently.

    McCarthy’s most ardent Republican critic, Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida, had made the speaker’s ouster his singular mission even before McCarthy made a surprise reversal on Saturday to avert a government shutdown. Gaetz ultimately persuaded seven Republicans to join him in voting to remove McCarthy via a procedural maneuver known as a motion to vacate the chair.

    Read: Kevin McCarthy finally defies the right

    Democrats faced their own conundrum: Was the speaker they knew a safer bet than a replacement they didn’t? Whichever Republican succeeds McCarthy is likely to be just as conservative and just as beholden to the hard-line faction that deposed him—if not more so. Yet Democrats ultimately decided that McCarthy was not worth rescuing; all 208 in attendance today voted to remove him.

    The speaker had lurched to the right far more often than he governed from the center; he had joined the bulk of the GOP in forgiving former President Donald Trump for his role in fomenting the Capitol insurrection on January 6, 2021, and just a month ago buckled to conservative demands to launch an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. “It is now the responsibility of the Republican members to end the House Republican Civil War,” the House minority leader, Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, declared after a lengthy Democratic Party conference this morning, urging members to support McCarthy’s removal as speaker.

    In the end, McCarthy almost survived only because Democrats struggled to get their members to the Capitol in time for the crucial votes. McCarthy, however, had suffered too many Republican defections for it to matter. The process began with a vote on a motion to table Gaetz’s motion to vacate the chair. Eleven Republicans voted with the entire Democratic caucus to clear the way for McCarthy’s ouster, more than twice as many members as the speaker could afford to lose within his own party. “The office of speaker of the House of the United States House of Representatives is hereby declared vacant,” Representative Steve Womack of Arkansas, presiding over the vote, said after the 216–210 roll call concluded.

    No obvious successor has emerged. McCarthy’s top lieutenant, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, is popular with conservatives but is now undergoing treatment for blood cancer. Majority Whip Tom Emmer or GOP Conference Chair Elise Stefanik could also emerge as alternatives, but neither has been openly campaigning for the job.

    Ever the optimist in public, McCarthy seemed to sense before the votes that the run of good fortune and political survival that had taken him to the nation’s third-highest office would not last much longer. He had struck a defiant tone, defending to the end his decision to keep the government open even if it cost him his job. “If you throw out a speaker” for averting a government shutdown, he warned reporters and, implicitly, his Republican colleagues, “then I think we’re in a really bad place.”

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    Russell Berman

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  • Sorry, Not Sorry: Jan. 6 Insurrectionists Change Their Tune Outside Of The Courtroom

    Sorry, Not Sorry: Jan. 6 Insurrectionists Change Their Tune Outside Of The Courtroom

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — Appearing before a federal judge after pleading guilty to a felony charge in the deadly Capitol riot, former West Virginia lawmaker Derrick Evans expressed remorse for letting down his family and his community, saying he made a “crucial mistake.”

    Less than a year later, Evans is portraying himself as a victim of a politically motivated prosecution as he runs to serve in the same building he stormed on Jan. 6, 2021. Evans is now calling the Justice Department’s Jan. 6 prosecutions a “miscarriage of justice” and describes himself on twitter as a “J6 Patriot.”

    “Some ppl have said I need to apologize and condemn #J6 if I want to win my election as the media will attack me,” he tweeted recently after announcing his bid for a U.S. House seat in 2024. “I will not compromise my values or beliefs. That’s what politicians do. We need Patriots not politicians.”

    Evans joins a series of Jan. 6 defendants who — when up against possible prison time in court — have expressed regret for joining the pro-Trump mob that rattled the foundations of American democracy only to strike a different tone or downplay the riot after receiving their punishment.

    The very first Jan. 6 defendant to be sentenced apologized in court and then went on Fox News Channel shortly after and seemed to minimize the riot. Another defendant who called Jan. 6 “horrifying and disgusting” later donned an orange jumpsuit to play the part of a distraught prisoner in a bizarre tribute to imprisoned Capitol rioters during a conservative conference.

    Some defendants have drawn ire from judges or the Justice Department for their inconsistent comments. But there’s not much the legal system can do for an adjudicated defendant. And because some conservatives hold up Jan. 6 defendants as martyrs, there’s a political and possibly financial incentive for them to change their tune.

    It could push judges to impose stronger punishments for rioters who haven’t yet made it to the end of their criminal cases. Even before Evans’ sentencing, the judge who heard his case began questioning the sincerity of rioters’ apologies after he felt duped by another defendant, saying he was “all too familiar with crocodile tears.”

    In some cases, judges have questioned whether they should undo defendants’ convictions or plea deals after they made statements in public that appeared to go against what they said in court. On Friday, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta ordered an Illinois man convicted this week to explain why the judge shouldn’t vacate his conviction after he agreed in court that he participated in the riot and then told a newspaper he didn’t actually think he committed the crimes with which he was charged.

    Before being sentenced last June to three months behind bars for a civil disorder charge, Evans said he regrets his actions every day and told Senior Judge Royce Lamberth he is a “good person who unfortunately was caught up in a moment.”

    Shortly after, prosecutors wrote to the judge about several statements Evans made on a radio show and that were “inconsistent with the contrition” he showed at sentencing. When asked whether he regretted his actions, Evans said on the show that he regretted the “situation” he was in. But he said he was “never going to have regrets when it comes to standing up and doing what’s right.”

    Evans said in an emailed statement to The Associated Press that he still stands behind what he said in court.

    “That was my message to the judge. This is my message to the media. It’s time to tell the real story of what happened personally to me that day,” he said.

    Evans said he lost “almost everything” — including his job as a state delegate and time with his kids — because of his decision on Jan. 6. “How could I not regret that?” he asked. But he said he is “done being portrayed as a villain” when he is not, noting that he didn’t overrun any officers and was inside the Capitol for only 10 minutes.

    When determining an appropriate sentence, judges generally take into account whether defendants have taken responsibility for their actions and appear genuinely sorry. In some Jan. 6 cases, judges have faulted defendants for not appearing to show true remorse even before their punishment has been handed down.

    A lawyer for Trennis Evans III, who took a swig of whiskey in a congressional conference room during the riot, told the judge in court papers that Evans was “sincerely remorseful, and duly contrite.” But after Evans suggested at his November sentencing that Jan. 6 defendants were being treated unfairly — even though he said he condemned what happened that day — the judge said she didn’t believe he showed “full and genuine remorse.”

    Months after he was ordered to serve 20 days in jail, the Texas man traveled to South Dakota to urge state lawmakers to support a resolution encouraging “the humane and fair treatment” of Jan. 6 defendants. The resolution failed by unanimous vote.

    The first Jan. 6 defendant to get her punishment, Anna Morgan-Lloyd, told Lamberth that she was ashamed of the “savage display of violence” at the Capitol before he sentenced her to probation. Shortly after, however, the Indiana woman told Fox News host Laura Ingraham that people were “very polite” during the riot and that she saw “relaxed” police officers chatting with rioters.

    Lamberth apparently hasn’t forgotten about it. The judge wrote in court papers that he hoped another defendant’s “change of heart” was sincere because his hopes were “dashed” in her case. In another case, he wrote that he “often finds it difficult to ascertain the sincerity” of Jan. 6 defendants’ remorse.

    “Many defendants appear sincere at sentencing, boasting of their purportedly deep shame, regret, and desire to change and be law-abiding citizens,” Lamberth wrote. “But this Court is all too familiar with crocodile tears.”

    Morgan-Lloyd’s attorney has said that she believes her client was genuinely remorseful, was “played” by Ingraham and sent the judge a letter after her TV interview. When contacted by The Associated Press, Morgan-Lloyd’s attorney said the woman would not comment.

    After he dodged prison time in his Jan. 6 case, right-wing activist Brandon Straka donned an orange jumpsuit and red MAGA cap, sat in a fake jail cell and performatively wept for a procession of attendees at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas last August. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican, entered the cage and embraced Straka before they appeared to pray together.

    Months earlier, with a possible jail term hanging over his head, Straka referred to Jan. 6 as “nothing more than an incredibly shameful day that had absolutely no positive attributes whatsoever.”

    “I’m sorry that I was present in any way at an event that led people to feel afraid, that caused shame and embarrassment on our country, and that served absolutely no purpose other than to further tear away at the already heartbreaking divide in this country,” he wrote in a letter to U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich, who sentenced him to 36 months of probation.

    An email seeking comment was sent to Straka, from Nebraska. He has said that the CPAC performance was meant “to provoke a reaction about political division, human rights abuses & more” and accused critics of trying to “criminalize art.”

    Since his sentencing, the judge questioned whether he wanted to withdraw his guilty plea and said he could be opening himself up to prosecution for making false statements because of public comments she said seemed to contradict things he said in court.

    A written statement of offense that Straka agreed was correct under his plea deal says that he yelled “Take it! Take it!” while filming others trying to take a police officer’s shield. Straka later told Fox News host Tucker Carlson that he told his lawyer that he never made that comment. He suggested he admitted doing so because he was under pressure to take a deal.

    Richer reported from Boston. Associated Press reporter Colleen Long contributed from Washington.

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  • Jan. 6 Panel Pushes Trump’s Prosecution In Forceful Finish

    Jan. 6 Panel Pushes Trump’s Prosecution In Forceful Finish

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    WASHINGTON (AP) — The House Jan. 6 committee is wrapping up its investigation of the violent 2021 U.S. Capitol insurrection, with lawmakers expected to cap one of the most exhaustive and aggressive congressional probes in memory with an extraordinary recommendation: The Justice Department should consider criminal charges against former President Donald Trump.

    At a final meeting on Monday, the panel’s seven Democrats and two Republicans are poised to recommend criminal charges against Trump and potentially against associates and staff who helped him launch a multifaceted pressure campaign to try to overturn the 2020 election.

    While a criminal referral is mostly symbolic, with the Justice Department ultimately deciding whether to prosecute Trump or others, it is a decisive end to a probe that had an almost singular focus from the start.

    “I think the president has violated multiple criminal laws and I think you have to be treated like any other American who breaks the law, and that is you have to be prosecuted,” Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., a member of the panel, said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

    From left, Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., staff counsel Dan George, Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-Fla., Chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., Vice Chair Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., staff counsel Candyce Phoenix, Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., and Rep. Elaine Luria, D-Va., sit on the dais as the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol holds a hearing at the Capitol in Washington, July 12, 2022. On Monday, Dec. 19, the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol will hold its final meeting. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

    J. Scott Applewhite via AP

    The panel, which will dissolve on Jan. 3 with the new Republican-led House, has conducted more than 1,000 interviews, held 10 well-watched public hearings and collected more than a million documents since it launched in July 2021. As it has gathered the massive trove of evidence, the members have become emboldened in declaring that Trump is to blame for the violent attack on the Capitol by his supporters almost two years ago.

    After beating their way past police, injuring many of them, the Jan. 6 rioters stormed the Capitol and interrupted the certification of President Joe Biden’s win, echoing Trump’s lies about widespread election fraud and sending lawmakers and others running for their lives.

    The attack came after weeks of Trump’s efforts to overturn his defeat — a campaign that was extensively detailed by the committee in its multiple public hearings. Many of Trump’s former aides testified about his unprecedented pressure on states, federal officials and on Vice President Mike Pence to find a way to thwart the popular will.

    “This is someone who in multiple ways tried to pressure state officials to find votes that didn’t exist, this is someone who tried to interfere with a joint session, even inciting a mob to attack the Capitol,” Schiff said. “If that’s not criminal, then I don’t know what it is.”

    Members of the committee have said that the referrals for other individuals may also include ethics violations, legal misconduct and campaign finance violations. Lawmakers have suggested in particular that their recommended charges against Trump could include conspiracy to defraud the United States, obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress and insurrection.

    On insurrection, Schiff said Sunday that “if you look at Donald Trump’s acts and you match them up against the statute, it’s a pretty good match.” He said that the committee will focus on those individuals — presumably Trump — for whom they believe there is the strongest evidence.

    While a so-called criminal referral has no real legal standing, it is a forceful statement by the committee and adds to political pressure already on Attorney General Merrick Garland and special counsel Jack Smith, who is conducting an investigation into Jan. 6 and Trump’s actions.

    The committee is also expected at the hearing to preview its massive final report, which will include findings, interview transcripts and legislative recommendations. Lawmaker have said a portion of that report will be released Monday.

    “We obviously want to complete the story for the American people,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., another member of the committee. “Everybody has come on a journey with us and we want a satisfactory conclusion, such that people feel that Congress has done its job.”

    Violent insurrectionists loyal to President Donald Trump stand outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)
    Violent insurrectionists loyal to President Donald Trump stand outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana, File)

    The panel was formed in the summer of 2021 after Senate Republicans blocked the formation of what would have been a bipartisan, independent commission to investigate the insurrection. That opposition spurred the Democratic-controlled House to form a committee of its own. House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy of California, a Trump ally, decided not to participate after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected some of his appointments. That left an opening for two anti-Trump Republicans in the House — Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois — to join the seven Democrats serving on the committee.

    While the committee’s mission was to take a comprehensive accounting of the insurrection and educate the public about what happened, they’ve also aimed their work at an audience of one: the attorney general. Lawmakers on the panel have openly pressured Garland to investigate Trump’s actions, and last month he appointed a special counsel, Smith, to oversee several probes related to Trump, including those related to the insurrection.

    In court documents earlier this year, the committee suggested criminal charges against Trump could include conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruction of an official proceeding of Congress.

    In a “conspiracy to defraud the United States,” the committee argues that evidence supports an inference that Trump and his allies “entered into an agreement to defraud the United States” when they disseminated misinformation about election fraud and pressured state and federal officials to assist in that effort. Trump still says he won the election to this day.

    The panel also asserts that Trump obstructed an official proceeding, the joint session of Congress in which the Electoral College votes are certified. The committee said Trump either attempted or succeeded at obstructing, influencing or impeding the ceremonial process on Jan. 6 and “did so corruptly” by pressuring Pence to try to overturn the results as he presided over the session. Pence declined to do so.

    The committee may make ethics referrals for five House Republicans — including McCarthy — who ignored congressional subpoenas from the panel. Those referrals are unlikely to result in punishment since Republicans are set to take over the House majority in January.

    Associated Press writers Eric Tucker, Farnoush Amiri and Lisa Mascaro contributed to this report.

    For full coverage of the Jan. 6 hearings, go to https://www.apnews.com/capitol-siege.

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  • National Safety Shelters Repurposes Safety Pods To Protect Government Officials From Violent Attacks

    National Safety Shelters Repurposes Safety Pods To Protect Government Officials From Violent Attacks

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    Officials and staff can now have instant access to near-absolute protection from armed intruders and bomb threats without restricting building access

    Press Release
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    updated: May 25, 2021


    WASHINGTON, May 25, 2021 (Newswire.com)
    –
    In response to the January 6 attack on the Capitol Building and the alarming Capitol Police report of a “107% increase in threats against Members [of Congress] compared to 2020,” National Safety Shelters is repurposing its line of Hide-Away safety pods and proposing that Congress consider acquiring them to protect Members and their staff from future violent attacks.

    INSTANT NEAR-ABSOLUTE PROTECTION

    The Hide-Away safety pods are bolt-together steel structures that provide instant access to safety from violent attacks and certain natural disasters (tornadoes, earthquakes). Fabricated using military-grade ballistic American steel, they protect against rounds shot from commonly used firearms and semi-automatic weapons like the AK47 and AR15. They also offer protection from the blast and shrapnel of IEDs.

    Originally designed to withstand the forces of EF-5 tornadoes and falling debris from earthquakes, the Hide-Away pods have since been installed in K-12 schools to protect students and staff from active shooters and tornadoes (in tornado prone areas). They are the only safety measure currently available that provides instant access to near-absolute protection.

    Small pods can be placed in personal offices and homes to protect from one to several individuals, whereas larger models can accommodate from dozens to hundreds of occupants, depending on the need. Each can be custom configured to fit into just about any available space.

    With a safety pod in each office, Members and staff can now have an unprecedented level of security that no other safety measure can achieve – instant protection. In addition to their use at the Capitol Complex, Members could also install them in their homes and district offices.

    This economical security safety net would only require a minute fraction of the $1.9 billion spending bill that Congress is currently proposing for security upgrades.

    SECURITY WITHOUT LIMITING BUILDING ACCESS

    Notably, the Hide-Away safety pods and shelters satisfy the recommendations outlined in the Capitol Security Review released on March 5, 2021 by Task Force 1-6  led by retired Army Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré. The recommendations seek “to improve the security of the Capitol, Members, and staff” in ways that will not reduce “physical access to the Capitol Complex.”

    Being that the pods would be installed either inside personal offices or at other easily accessible interior locations throughout the Complex, there would be no impact on physical access to either the Capitol Building or other office buildings within the Complex. Should a violent attack occur, casualties could virtually be eliminated.

    In view of the current threat level to Members and the uptick in mass shootings this year (212 as of 5/13), National Safety Shelters is in the process of introducing this innovative security safety net to all 535 Members of Congress, federal security and law enforcement agencies and all 50 state governments.

    For more information please contact Sarah Corrado at 1-772-248-0236 or sarah@nationalsafetyshelters.com.

    Source: National Safety Shelters

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