GOP Rep. Tim Burchett (Tenn.) got into a physical altercation with a protester Thursday outside the Longworth House Office Building in Washington.
The demonstrator approached Burchett with criticism on the handling of the war in Gaza and later bumped the lawmaker.
The Tennessee representative responded to being physically accosted by pushing the person.
“Everyone has a right to their opinion, and they can say all of the filthy stuff they want. But they don’t have the right to bump the congressman,” Burchett spokesperson Will Garrett said in a statement to The Hill.
Capitol Police declined to comment on the matter but did question the protester involved, Politico reported.
Last year, Burchett introduced a resolution to reject the United Nations’s decision to place the Israeli military on a list of child’s rights abusers.
“Israel is our greatest ally in the Middle East and their leadership tries to protect life. Hamas, on the other hand, hides behind innocent civilians like a bunch of cowards. We need to make it clear to the United Nations that the United States completely supports Israel’s efforts to wipe these terrorists off the map,” Burchett said at the time.
In recent months, demonstrators have begun to swarm Washington with gruesome images of bloodshed in the Gaza Strip.
Many have stationed themselves adjacent to the Capitol at the Hall of States, where MSNBC, Fox News and C-Span are housed. Some are hoping to draw more attention to the frequent air strikes in the region and raise concerns about starvation.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has been a vocal critic of the conflict and has urged the Trump administration to stop supporting Israel with weapons of war.
“U.S. taxpayers fund Israel $3.8 billion annually for military aid. That means every U.S. tax payer is contributing to Israel’s military actions,” Greene wrote in a late August post on the social platform X.
“I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to pay for genocide in a foreign country against a foreign people for a foreign war that I had nothing to do with. And I will not be silent about it,” she added.
