Quantcast

Va. Senate moving against GOP Sen. Amanda Chase

Free Press staff, wire reports | 1/21/2021, 6 p.m.
The state Senate is lowering the hammer on GOP Sen. Amada Chase of Chesterfield for speaking and whipping up the …
Sen. Chase

The state Senate is lowering the hammer on GOP Sen. Amada Chase of Chesterfield for speaking and whipping up the crowd at a pro-Trump rally in Washington on Jan. 6 before the mob stormed the U.S. Capitol.

The Senate is advancing a resolution to censure Sen. Chase for “fomenting insurrection against the United States,” saying she helped incite the rioters who crashed through barricades, broke through police lines and into the Capitol, vandalizing offices, stealing electronic equipment and threatening to kidnap or hurt members of Congress. Five people died in the attack, including a U.S. Capitol Police officer who was beaten with a fire extinguisher.

A Senate committee voted Tuesday to approve the censure resolution, while earlier in the day, the Senate voted nearly unanimously to strip Sen. Chase of her one and only committee assignment.

The censure resolution was passed along party lines, with Democrats saying that Sen. Chase, an outspoken supporter both of President Trump and gun rights, deserved punishment for repeatedly promoting his baseless claims of election fraud, praising the rioters and calling for martial law to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Sen. John Bell, a Northern Virginia lawmaker who sponsored the resolution, said Sen. Chase mimicked the same type of behavior that led to President Trump being impeached.

“We must be held to a higher standard,” Sen. Bell said.

Sen. Chase, who also is running for the GOP nomination for governor, recently had restrictions placed on her Facebook account after falsely blaming antifa activists for the deadly insurrection at the Capitol.

Republicans distanced themselves from Sen. Chase, but voted against the resolution on the grounds that it was an infringement of her free speech rights.

“This country has dramatically shifted from the belief of freedom of speech to a culture of freedom from speech,” said GOP Sen. Bryce Reeves of Orange County.

The resolution now goes to the full Senate for a vote, where Democrats have a narrow majority.

Sen. Chase said she plans to introduce censure resolutions against Democratic lawmakers who attended protests last summer focused on racial justice and removing Confederate statues.

She also said she’s being unfairly targeted because of her outspoken support for the former president and because she’s running for governor without the backing of the state’s Republican establishment.

“This is all about their lack of tolerance for anyone that supported President Donald J. Trump, of which I am one of the biggest advocates for,” Sen. Chase said.