Republicans Remove Metal Detectors From House Chamber

After gaining control of the House, Republicans are choosing to forego some of the safety measures installed following the January 6, 2021, Capitol attack, including the metal detectors at the entrance of the House chamber.

Then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) ordered the magnetometers be put in place to protect the lawmakers in the wake of the violence that ensued as President Joe Biden‘s 2020 election win was being certified. Pelosi leveraged fines against the GOP lawmakers who opted to bypass the security measures. The fine for the first offense was $5,000, before doubling to $10,000 for a second offense.

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Some House Democrats have made it clear that they felt safer with the magnetometers in place, especially as news came out that threats of violence against members of Congress rose from 3,939 in 2017 to 9,625 in 2021, according to the U.S. Capitol police.

“The January 6 select committee said that the forces that Trump arrayed against us are still out there,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland), who was on the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack, said. “We need to be taking every precaution to make sure that January 6 [2021] doesn’t become a dress rehearsal for the next event.”

Others, like Colorado Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert, believe that the extra safety measures only separated the lawmakers from the American people.

“When I arrived in Congress two years, Nancy Pelosi put this hunk of garbage outside of the House chambers for members of Congress to go through,” Boebert said in a statement. “Today, they are being removed and we are turning Pelosi’s House back into the people’s House.”