"We are a democracy. But we can lose that democracy."

This afternoon, Washington Senator Patty Murray, who has been in the Senate for more than 32 years, rose to condemn the treatment of California Senator Alex Padilla, who was manhandled out of a press conference being held by DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, after saying he had questions to ask and identifying himself as a United States Senator.

Noem said afterwards on Fox News that Padilla lunged toward the podium where she was speaking and failed to identify himself.

But the video doesn’t seem to reflect that, although it starts midway into the incident. Watch it from various angles and judge for yourself. This version is circulating on a number of senators’ accounts. This one starts a little earlier and is from a different perspective. In this video, agents shove Padilla to the ground and order him to put his hands behind his back before someone tells the person taking the video it isn’t allowed there.

DHS had this to say. You can watch the video and make up your own mind about whether this reflects what you see on tape.

This is not hard. Every Republican member of Congress should join Democrats in condemning this administration’s vicious treatment of Senator Padilla. “A Republic if you can keep it” is now.

Senator Murray spoke off the cuff, full of the emotion of the moment, on the floor of the Senate. She said exactly what needed to be said. As I listened, my reaction was, “Everyone needs to hear this.” So tonight, I’m sharing her words, which her office was gracious enough to provide, with you. If you’re as moved by her words as I was, I hope you’ll share them with friends and family.

“Mr. President, I come to the floor this afternoon, to the United States Senate, a place where people are elected by their constituents to come here to be their voice, every one of us. Republican, Democrat, elected by the people who we represent, to come here and be their voice and to do the job.

What is that job? To make sure that we are being their voice and speaking out for them, and part of that has to be asking questions. Part of that has to be demanding accountability. That has to be getting information so we can do the best job possible.

It is unacceptable that a United States Senator, in his own home state, elected by millions of people, went to ask a question for his constituents, to get an answer, and was brutally thrown to the ground and handcuffed.

That is wrong, and I cannot believe that we don't have Senators on both sides of the aisle calling this out as outrageous.

This is what a democracy is about, Mr. President. Mr. President, it is about us coming to the United States Senate, speaking out, asking questions, getting information, so we can be their voice.

What happens when that voice is stifled? What happens when that voice is thrown to the floor and handcuffed? Our democracy is lost.

Mr. President, I have been here more than 32 years. I have come to this floor often to speak out, to be angry, to be a voice for my people. I have never come this close to having tears in my eyes, as I speak to both sides of this aisle, about this horrendous incident that occurred.

We are a democracy, but we can lose that democracy. It can be gone, unless all of us speak out and forcibly reject what happened to a United States Senator.

And to send the message that in this democracy it is just, it is right, it is part of our responsibility to speak up, to ask questions, and to be able to have the knowledge we need to represent the people that we come here for.

We use our voices, Mr. President. We use our votes, Mr. President, to be a part of this democracy. Not violence.

When violence is done by someone representing this administration, in a forceful way, against a United States Senator, how does any one of us go home and tell our constituents that they can be part of a democracy, speak out about what they believe in?

This is so wrong. This is so wrong.

Mr. President, I hope others speak up and speak out, and as a voice we say we want our democracy to succeed, and in order to succeed we need to be able to use our voices and to use our votes and to ask questions without being forcibly thrown to the ground, without being arrested by speaking up.

I say to the entire country, we have a democracy. We will lose it if we can't use our voices. We will lose this democracy. None of us should be silent. None of us.”

There will be days of legal arguments about what happened here. But tonight, just sit with the emotion for a minute.

“We use our voices. We use our votes.” Senator Murray is exactly right. None of us can afford to be quiet, because we can lose this democracy if we don’t take steps to protect it.

We’re in this together,

Joyce