(WASHINGTON) — U.S. Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger on Tuesday said his department is looking at providing added security for members of Congress after last week’s assault on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband.
“The USCP has engaged in a review of Friday’s incident,” Manger said in a statement. “We believe today’s political climate calls for more resources to provide additional layers of physical security for Members of Congress. This plan would include an emphasis on adding redundancies to the measures that are already in place for Congressional leadership. Hopefully you can understand that we cannot disclose the details about these improvements because our country cannot afford to make it easier for any potential bad actors.”
A man allegedly broke into the Pelosi home and assaulted Paul Pelosi, in what the San Francisco District Attorney called politically motivated violence.
Manger said, after the shootings of both Rep. Gabby Giffords and Rep. Steve Scalise, his agency has made security improvements, but today’s threat landscape means improvements are “increasingly urgent.”
Capitol Police are considering extending protection to families, according to sources, but no decision has been made.
“The USCP has worked diligently to investigate reported threats, improve intelligence collection and analysis, and strengthen our partnerships with law enforcement agencies across the country to provide security for Members when they are traveling outside Washington, DC,” he said.
Threats against lawmakers have more than doubled since 2017, according to USCP statistics provided to ABC News. In 2017, there were nearly 4,000 and in 2021 there were nearly 10,000.
After the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol Police went through a large-scale department overhaul, according to the agency, making changes from top to bottom.
“While progress has been made, there is still a lot of work to do,” Manger said. “The Department’s long-term plans to expand our protective operations are already underway — their importance only emphasized by Friday’s brutal attack. We will continue to work with our Congressional partners to add additional agents and security enhancements to support our protective operations mission.”
He said the department monitors “thousands” of cases across the country and their mission remain unchanged.
“During this time of heightened political tension, we continue to monitor thousands of cases across the country — in an effort to stop potential threats before they make headlines,” he said. Over the past five years, 12% of cases in which USCP has identified making threats have been prosecuted.
“We hope to see more of these cases prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”
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