Congresswoman Tenney, House Colleagues Request Answers from Speaker Pelosi About Plans to Fence-In the Capitol Building

Washington, DC – Congresswoman Claudia Tenney (NY-22) today joined her House Republican colleagues in a letter to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. The letter addressed plans by the Speaker and Capitol Police to once again erect fencing around the U.S. Capitol building without any evidence being provided of an imminent security threat.

Recent reports suggest that Capitol Police would reinstall security fencing around the Capitol building prior to the arrival of a trucker convoy protest in Washington, D.C. around the time of next week’s State of the Union address by President Joe Biden. The Capitol perimeter was previously fenced-in from January 2021 through July 2021, and the Capitol building has been closed to the public since March 2020. Tenney has been a vocal critic of the Capitol’s continued closure to the American people and recently sent a letter to the House Sergeant-at-Arms demanding the Capitol reopen to the public immediately.

Tenney also has come out in support of the Trucker Convoy protests that recently took place in Ottawa, Canada, and in strong opposition to the Canadian government’s draconian vaccine mandates and undemocratic crackdown on peaceful protests. Tenney is an advocate of protecting First Amendment ideals and believes in the right of all to protest peacefully, without retribution from their own government. Last week, Tenney joined 63 of her House colleagues in urging President Biden to work with the Canadian government to reverse the vaccine mandate in place for essential travel at the Northern Border.

“For nearly two years, you have locked the American people out of the halls of Congress. We are demanding you either overrule the decision by U.S. Capitol security to place fencing around the Capitol grounds, or you give all members of Congress a full briefing on the supposedly imminent and dire threat the State of the Union faces,” the lawmakers wrote in part.

The full text of the letter is available here.

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