'Inconceivable That Kristi Noem Did Not Know Who Senator Alex Padilla Is': Democratic Lawmaker

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On "Forbes Newsroom," Rep. Mike Levin (D-CA) responded to Sen. Alex Padilla's (D-CA) forcible removal from DHS Secretary Kristi Noem's press briefing.

Transcript

00:00incident we saw yesterday with senator alex padilla he during um or fbi officers physically

00:07removed him from a press conference held by homeland uh security secretary christy noem

00:12in la on thursday as he attempted to shout questions at her after he was escorted out of

00:18the room he then was put on the ground and handcuffed what do you make of the incident

00:22well it was surreal to me you know i was sitting in the appropriations committee room during the

00:26markup watching the clip of senator padilla over and over again trying to understand what had

00:33happened and let me just first say that senator padilla and i have known each other since our 20s

00:38he's five years older than i am he is a decent and honorable public servant and in general is a very

00:45mild-mannered person and i understand the circumstances as follows in that federal

00:52building senator padilla has an office he wanted to see the press conference with secretary noem

01:00he was allowed into the room by law enforcement there was clearly a lack of communication or

01:07coordination between whoever let him in that room and the u.s secret service detail protecting

01:13secretary noem because it appears that that detail did not know who alex padillas the senior senator from

01:19california was and they were protecting uh christy noem as they you know are supposed to now here's the

01:27thing i've been interrupted at at town halls and press conferences over the years so in that circumstance

01:35if you know who that person is who is interrupting you it could be you know somebody that you've seen

01:40before somebody that you recognize you give them the space to speak and you tell them i'm going to need

01:48you to calm down otherwise we're going to have to ask you to leave and then if they refuse at that point

01:55you may need to get law enforcement involved in this instance it is inconceivable that christy noem did not

02:04know who senator alex padilla is senator padilla is the ranking member on the appropriation or excuse me on

02:11the immigration subcommittee directly relevant the the subcommittee of direct jurisdiction that oversees

02:19noem's work so she of course she knew who he was she absolutely knew who he was then after they you know

02:28get him out and they put him on the ground they put him in handcuffs the the reporting that i've seen

02:33suggested corey lewandowski was the one to say let him go and you know you can read into that whatever

02:38you like and they let him go now knowing that he's united states senator he's saying all the time i'm

02:43a united states senator others in that room knew who he was by the way i'll buy that those secret

02:48service officers did not that they were doing their job protecting secretary noem but the other thing is

02:55i was really uh taken aback by dan bongino's post about all this saying that secretary or senator padilla

03:01wasn't wearing his pin so here's the thing we have these pins members of the house members of the senate

03:07we don't have to wear them outside of the capitol united states i'm wearing mine right now because

03:12i wanted to look nice for my interview with you but i don't have to wear this pin just out there in

03:18the community in my district it is my identification in the capitol not outside of the capitol and so

03:25senator padilla was not wearing his pin but he didn't have to be wearing his pin for goodness sake so

03:29that wasn't a good reason at all from dan bongino's comment so all that being said i think that secretary

03:37noem really you know she very easily could have uh de-escalated the situation she knew it was

03:45senator padilla and she chose to go right on speaking if you watch that video she didn't pause for one

03:51second she kept speaking she knew what was happening and she was fine with it happening and she didn't even

03:58apologize to padilla after it's the whole thing is surreal to me having known senator padilla for

04:0420 years uh and as i've said the last couple days if you're critical of this administration

04:12they don't want to hear that criticism this is what we see in countries other than the united

04:17states of america this is not american at all and if it can happen to a senior u.s senator it can happen to

04:24anybody

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