Senator urges university action after floor accusation that a healthcare worker posted instructions encouraging violence against federal officers
Loading...
Summary
A Virginia senator publicly accused a healthcare worker at a taxpayer-supported medical institution of posting social-media videos encouraging violence and poisoning of federal immigration officers, and called on the institution and its board to act; senators on the floor condemned the rhetoric in strong terms.
During Tuesday's floor remarks, the senator from Franklin County told colleagues that a health-care worker employed at a major public medical institution had posted social-media videos that, the senator said, included specific instructions encouraging assault, poisoning and other acts against immigration and customs enforcement agents.
The senator described the posts as "not vague threats," saying they contained "specific calculated instructions for assaults and perhaps even murder," and that the worker had urged followers to contaminate food, harvest poison plants to spray into officers' faces, and otherwise sabotage officers' living conditions. The senator called the behavior "incitement to violence" and urged the affected institution's leadership — including the board of visitors — to take swift action.
"These are instructions for criminal assault," the senator said on the floor, adding that the worker was entrusted with patient care and had taken an oath to "do no harm." He called on fellow senators to join in condemning the rhetoric.
The floor exchange was a public allegation and not a legal finding; the transcript records the senator's statements but does not include responses from the named healthcare worker, the medical institution, or law enforcement. The remarks prompted a general floor admonition that violence is not an acceptable form of protest and that calls for poisoning are criminal if true.
Provenance: allegation introduced at SEG 2754–2796.
