WASHINGTON -- House Democrats voiced resolve Wednesday to censure Republican Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona and strip him of his committee assignments for tweeting an animated video that depicted him striking Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., with a sword.
Democrats were moving quickly and forcefully to sanction Gosar for the video released a week ago, while Republicans warned that the effort sets a precedent that could come back to haunt Democrats if they find themselves in the minority. It's the second time this year the majority has initiated the removal of a GOP lawmaker from an assigned committee, the first being Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia.
The parties of those involved is irrelevant, Democrats said.
"If Democrats do something as egregious as Mr. Gosar, they ought to be censured about it," House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said. "This is not a partisan issue. This is an issue about safety."
Democratic lawmakers said Gosar's actions amounted to threatening another member's life.
"We have to address it immediately," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. "I'm so pleased that our members understand that this is central to our work in Congress."
Gosar, a six-term congressman, posted the video over a week ago with a note saying, "Any anime fans out there?" The roughly 90-second video was an altered version of a Japanese anime clip, interspersed with shots of Border Patrol officers and migrants at the southern U.S. border.
During one roughly 10-second section, animated characters whose faces had been replaced with Gosar, Greene and Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., were shown fighting other animated characters. Gosar's character is seen striking another one made to look like Ocasio-Cortez in the neck with a sword. The video also shows him attacking President Joe Biden.
"I don't know if it was to create harm, if it was to incite violence, if it was to fuel hate, but it probably accomplished all of those things," said Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas.
Last week, Gosar issued a statement saying the video wasn't meant to depict harm or violence, calling it instead "a symbolic portrayal of a fight over immigration policy."
Gosar told his House Republican colleagues during a private meeting Tuesday that he would never espouse violence or harm to anyone. He noted that he took the video down from his account, according to a person in the room who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private meeting.
Ocasio-Cortez said he has not apologized to her.
"It's been well over a week. He not only has not apologized," she said. "He not only has not made any sort of contact or outreach, neither he nor the Republican leader (Kevin) McCarthy, but he has also doubled down by saying that I am somehow, you know, representative of undocumented people."
"In a perfect world, he'd be expelled," she told reporters. "We are not in a perfect world, so censure and removal from committee I believe is appropriate."
The resolution states that depictions of violence can foment actual violence and jeopardize the safety of elected officials. It also cites the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol as an example. It says violence against women in politics is a global phenomenon meant to silence and discourage them from seeking positions of authority and participating in public life, with women of colour disproportionately impacted.
If approved by a majority of the House, censure requires the censured lawmaker to stand in the well of the House as the resolution of censure is read aloud by the House speaker.
The House has censured its members on 23 occasions, six previous times this century. The last was in 2010 involving Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel, the former chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, for financial misconduct. The censure carries no practical effect, except to provide a historic footnote that marks a lawmaker's career.
The resolution would remove Gosar from his two committees: Natural Resources and the Oversight and Reform panel, on which Ocasio-Cortez also serves.
Republicans warned Democrats to be careful about dictating the punishment of those who serve in the minority because of the precedent it will set.
"This is a dark and dangerous road the majority is going down," Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma, the ranking Republican on the House Rules Committee, said Tuesday. "I urge you for the future of the chamber to rethink this course."
Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., was one of the few Republicans saying he would vote to censure Gosar.
"We have to hold Members accountable who incite or glorify violence, who spread and perpetuate dangerous conspiracies. The failure to do so will take us one step closer to this fantasized violence becoming real," Kinzinger tweeted.
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Associated Press writer Alan Fram contributed to this report
