Police in Virginia on Monday named the suspect in a violent attack in which two staffers for a Democratic congressman were assaulted with a baseball bat, requiring hospital treatment.
Xuan Kha Tran Pham, 49, was arrested after the attack at Gerry Connolly’s office in Fairfax. Connolly told CNN one staff member was hit in the head while the other, an intern on her first day in the job, was hit on the side.
Connolly said the attacker, a constituent, caused widespread damage to the office, including shattering glass and breaking computers.
“The thought that someone would take advantage of my staff’s accessibility to commit an act of violence is unconscionable and devastating,” Connolly said in a statement.
He told CNN the suspected attacker “was filled with out of control rage”.
A police spokesperson, Sgt Lisa Gardner, said police were called at about 10.50am. Connolly was not at the office, Gardner said, adding that some staff members hid during the attack.
Acts of political extremism, including ones targeting lawmakers, have become increasingly common in the US.
Last October, Paul Pelosi, husband of the former Democratic House speaker Nancy Pelosi, was attacked in his home in San Francisco by a man armed with a hammer.
Afterwards, the Michigan representative Debbie Dingell predicted “somebody is going to die”.
Speaking to Axios, Dingell said that two years previously, after the now fired Fox News host Tucker Carlson broadcast a segment about her, she “had men outside my home with assault weapons that night”.
The Democratic governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer, was the target of a rightwing kidnap plot foiled by law enforcement.
Justice Samuel Alito, meanwhile, has complained of an increase in threats to members of the supreme court. Last year, a man was charged with attempting to kill Brett Kavanaugh, like Alito a member of the 6-3 conservative majority.
Connolly, 73, has represented the 11th congressional district in Virginia since 2009. A prominent Democratic voice in Congress, he frequently spars with Republicans who control the House.
Connolly last week criticised CNN’s decision to host Donald Trump for a town hall in New Hampshire, telling Fox News that the event was a “travesty”.
“Why would you put a liar and a convicted criminal on a town hall?” Connolly asked during his appearance on the network. “And why would you give him that privilege? … To me, it is frankly reprehensible.”
Trump is not a convicted criminal. Last week, in a civil case in New York, he was found liable for sexual assault and defamation against the writer E Jean Carroll.
On Monday, Connolly thanked police and emergency medical professionals. The person who attacked his office was taken into custody, he said, adding that his focus was on ensuring his staff members were “receiving the care they need”.
“I have the best team in Congress,” Connolly said. “My district office staff make themselves available to constituents and members of the public every day.”
Mark Warner, one of two Democratic senators from Virginia, said: “Intimidation and violence – especially against public servants – has no place in our society. This is an extraordinarily disturbing development, and my thoughts are with the staff members who were injured.”
Jason Miyares, the Republican attorney general of Virginia, wished Connolly’s staff members well and said: “Political violence is always unacceptable. The coward who did this should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
But Dan Goldman, a Democratic congressman from New York, linked the attack to remarks about political violence by Republicans.
“This is horrifying,” Goldman wrote. “From ‘very fine people on both sides’” – which Donald Trump said about violence at a far-right march in Virginia in 2017 – “to calling January 6 a ‘peaceful protest’, there are serious consequences when elected officials refuse to condemn or outright glorify political violence.”
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
