WASHINGTON – The FBI and police are investigating attacks and threats against Democratic members of Congress who voted for healthcare reform as a senior House of Representatives Democrat said on Wednesday that his colleagues were at risk.
Democrats have criticised heated Republican rhetoric, including 2008 vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s Twitter comment urging supporters “Don’t Retreat, Instead – RELOAD”.
A Palin Facebook post continued the firearms theme, featuring a US map targeting 20 members of Congress who backed the healthcare legislation, using the crosshairs of a gunsight to note each of their home states.
The House gave the healthcare measure – President Barack Obama’s top domestic priority – final congressional approval on Sunday and the president signed it into law on Tuesday.
An FBI spokeswoman said the agency, the US Capitol Police and other law enforcement officers were investigating threats and incidents of violence against members of Congress.
House majority leader Steny Hoyer said police and the FBI were concerned about “very serious incidents” that had taken place since Sunday’s vote.
Some lawmakers have received death threats, bricks were tossed through the windows of one House member’s office in New York state, another lawmaker was spat upon by a protester on Capitol Hill, and another still was the target of a racial slur.
In response to a reporter’s question, Mr Hoyer said he considered his congressional colleagues to be at risk.
Representative Louise Slaughter, a New York Democrat whose Niagara Falls office was vandalised and whose campaign office received a voicemail referring to snipers last week, said in a statement she was disturbed that Republican leaders appeared to be “fanning the flames with coded rhetoric”.
Ms Slaughter noted that Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee, took aim at House speaker Nancy Pelosi in an interview on Fox News.
He told viewers, “let’s start getting Nancy ready for the firing line in November”.
The Republican party’s website features a picture of Ms Pelosi in front of a wall of flames and urges visitors to the site to “make a donation to help us win 40 seats in 2010 and fire Nancy Pelosi”.
Meanwhile, Congressional Democrats were attempting yesterday to complete a package of fixes to the reform package voted on Sunday.
The Senate was expected to vote on the package of revisions yesterday and send them to the House of Representatives, where Mr Hoyer said a final vote could come as early as last night.
In a final stand against the reforms, Senate Republicans pushed dozens of amendments designed to force Democrats to take difficult political positions before November’s elections.
Democrats were methodically rejecting the amendments in a round-the-clock voting session that started on Wednesday night.
The rejected Republican amendments included proposals to deny erectile dysfunction drugs to sex offenders, to ensure that insurance premiums do not increase under the law, and to prevent tax increases for families earning less than $250,000.
The package must go back to the House after the Senate parliamentarian upheld two Republican challenges under procedural rules, Senate Democratic aides said.
The challenges involve the package’s revamp of the student loan programme, said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid. Under reconciliation rules, each provision in the package must have a budgetary impact.
The decision sets up another potentially difficult vote, but Ms Pelosi said Democrats would have the votes to pass it again. – (Reuters)