Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, said he wants answers about the June 12 incident in which Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif. was handcuffed during a media briefing conducted by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, Axios reported.
"I am Sen. Alex Padilla, I have questions for the secretary," Padilla said during the press conference at the Wilshire Federal Building in Los Angeles, where Noem was answering questions about protests in the city related to immigration enforcement actions.
Video showed a Secret Service agent on Noem's security detail grabbing the California senator by his jacket and shoving him from the room as he tried to speak up during the DHS secretary's event. Padilla interrupted the news conference after Noem said federal authorities were not going away but planned to stay and increase operations to "liberate" the city from its "socialist" leadership.
Scuffling with officers outside the room, he can be heard bellowing, "Hands off!" He is later seen on his knees and then pushed to the ground and handcuffed in a hallway, with several officers atop him.
In a letter to FBI Director Kash Patel, Raskin asked, "Can you explain why asking government officials to answer basic questions is such a threat to this Administration that it would resort to such tactics against a United States Senator?
"This Administration has much to answer for. It has sent masked agents in unmarked vans to disappear people from American streets," he wrote.
Raskin demanded Patel "immediately provide answers and conduct an investigation into the FBI's role in this disgraceful and indefensible assault of a Member of Congress."
Trump adviser Dick Morris told Newsmax that he believed Padilla was attempting to pull off a political stunt.
"It's really a show for their own constituency," he said. Morris added, "I think that Democrats always react to electoral defeats by moving to the left and becoming more and more outrageous and more and more strident in their demands."
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
Jim Mishler ✉
Jim Mishler, a seasoned reporter, anchor and news director, has decades of experience covering crime, politics and environmental issues.