Kevin McCarthy: Rowdy Democrats Broke Furniture, Insulted House Staffers During Anti-Gun Rights Sit-in

The House Majority Leader told reporters at a Capitol Hill briefing Tuesday that he and Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R.-Wis.) are working with the House Sergeant-at-Arms to catalog how Democrats broke House rules, broke House furniture, and broke a tradition of civility by their rudeness to House employees during their June 22 sit-in on the floor of the lower chamber.

House Democrats were completely outside of the way the House of Representatives should function, said Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R.-Calif.). “The behavior that was put onto the floor, the disrespect to the rules — the fundraising going on during this activity — there are also some looks at damage done and the reports of behavior towards some of the professional staff that were given to me, who were around and who watched the actions take place.”

The focus of the inquest is Rule XVII, which governs Decorum and Debate, which is supervised by the Sergeant-at-Arms. In addition to violations protocols, McCarthy said he was particularly upset that Democrats spoke to House professionals in a disrespectful tone and that he had reports of a Democratic Member of Congress knocking something out of a staffers hand–which he considered a terrible breach of decorum.

McCarthy said he challenged Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) and her whip Rep. Steny Hoyer (D.-Md.) regarding the sit-in. “Is this the behavior they want to see on the House floor?”

Despite the Democrats being in the minority, there are rules and procedures available to them to advance their agenda that they ignored, he said.

“There are rules for people to have a voice,” he said. “There are disagreements–but, you can do it in a manner that shows democracy–not only to this country, but also to the world h0w democracy works.”

McCarthy said the House Sergeant-at-Arms and his staff would review videos from the House floor and interview individuals, who were there while the Democrats said they would not leave the well of the chamber until Ryan promised to let them vote on a bill that would block firearm sales to known or suspected terrorists, a No-Fly-No-Buy bill.

The leader said he did not want to reward the Democrats.

However, the speaker did hold a June 30 conference call with the House Republican Conference telling them he will have a vote on a No-Fly-No-Buy bill before the next recess.