The Alex Padilla altercation was captured on video but still seen through a political lens

One day after the federal agents retained and forcibly handcuffed Sen Alex Padilla at a press conference in Los Angeles, the leaders of the two political parties in the country responded in what has become a predictable way – with diametrically opposed to the incident.

Padilla Democratic colleagues called for an investigation and perhaps even to resign the senator’s sworn enemy, the Secretary of Homeland Security, Kristi Noem, for what they described as the unprecedented mailbox of an American senator who was simply trying to ask another official.

Noem and his republican colleagues continued to represent Padilla as a large -stretch, whose unexpected appearance at the Noem press conference seemed to his security detail to represent a threat, while she was trying to speak to journalists of the Westwood Federal Building.

The Republicans continued on Friday to chastise Padilla, using words as “launch”, “ring” and “bum rush” to describe Padilla’s behavior while he was starting to try to ask Noem during the press conference on Thursday.

The Trump administration manager was only a few minutes away from his meeting with journalists when Padilla moved in a assertive way on the side of the play, passing a photographer of times while he was traveling to address Noem more directly. He did not rush against Noem and was still detaching himself from her when her security details caught the senator.

Padilla and his staff described how the veteran legislator experienced security and was escorted by an FBI employee in the room where the press conference took place, saying that it was absurd to suggest that he had presented a threat.

Padilla expressed himself after the secretary said that her internal security agents came to Los Angeles to “release the city of the socialists and the heavy leadership that the governor and the mayor placed in this country”.

The former governor of southern Dakota would have a reason to recognize Padilla because he questioned him during his confirmation hearing of the Senate. A spokesperson for the Department of Internal Security did not answer the question of whether Noem admitted Padilla upon arrival at his press conference.

As has become the norm in the country’s political discourse, the Republicans and the Democrats spoke of the confrontation on Friday as if they had observed two entirely distinct incidents.

Senator Ben Ray Lujan (DN.M.) said that Noem “should resign”, adding: “It’s ridiculous. And she continues to lie about this incident. This is false.”

Lujan urged her Republican colleagues to help Democrats ask for “a complete investigation”.

“It’s bad. This is a precedent,” Lujan told MSNBC. “And I certainly hope that the management of the Senate, my republican leaders, my friends, that they look inside. Pray on it. This is what I said to a few last night. Pray on it and do the right thing.”

Members of the Hispanic Caucus of Congress went to the office of President Mike Johnson to protest against the treatment of Padilla.

Senator Cory Booker (DN.J.) spoke of X and on the prosecution of the Senate. He said that the episode was part of “a model of behavior by the Trump administration. There is simply no justification for this abuse of authority … There can be no justification to see a forced senator on his knees ”.

Representative Joaquin Castro (D-TEXAS) continued X to repeat the call to an investigation and say that “republican management is an accomplice to allow increasing authoritarianism in this country”.

Speaking publicly, a single republican legislator seemed a note of distress about the episode.

“I saw this clip. It’s horrible,” said senator Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). “It’s shocking at all levels. It is not America I know.”

But most of the Republicans have remained silent or accused Padilla of being a provocative.

“I think that the actions of the senator, I think it was extremely inappropriate,” said Johnson, the president of the room. “You do not charge a secretary to the seated cabinet.”

Johnson added that it was Padilla, who should face a sanction. “At least … [it] climb to censorship. … I think there must be a message sent by the body as a whole that this is not what we are going to do, this is not how we are going to act. »»

The representative Tom McClintock, (R-Elk Grove) Zing Padilla on X, with “useful advice”. “1. Does not disturb the press conferences of others. Stay in place. 2. Do not shake up a podium without visible identification. … 3. Do not resist or do not associate the secret services. It will not end well. ”

Representative Jay Obernolte (R-Big Bear Lake) also sought to strengthen the idea that agents protecting Noem felt a real threat, having no way of knowing that Padilla was what he said.

The Congress member said on Fox Business that Padilla had obtained “the result they wanted. Now they have a subject of discussion. ”

None of the civil servants in the room, many of whom know Padilla, intervened to prevent the action of agents, who finally pushed the senator, facing down, on the ground, before handling it.

Noem did not decide his previous statement according to which Padilla had “broken” in the room.

“Senator Padilla has chosen an disrespectful political theater and has interrupted a live press conference without identifying or having its Senate security pin while it rushed to secretary Noem,” Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of internal security, said on Friday.

McLaughlin also said that Padilla “had been invited to retreat several times and did not comply with the repeated commands of officers”, although the video made public did not show such warnings, before Padilla’s first declaration.

Senator staff said that he had received concern messages from several Republican colleagues, including senator Tim Sheehy (R-Mont.)

Padilla told Tommy Vietor of the Podcast “Pod Save America” ​​that the aggressive repression of Trump’s immigration is an attempt to distract many other failures – continuous instability with the economy, a lack of peace in Ukraine and Gaza and a federal budgetary plan which turns out to be unpopular with many Americans.

“He always finds a distraction,” said Padilla, “and when everything else fails, he returns to demonize and immigrants from scapegoats. … He creates a crisis to make us talk about something else.”

Padilla has repeatedly said that the Americans should be concerned about how everyday citizens will be treated, if the forces working for the Trump administration are authorized to “tackle” an American senator asking questions in a public building.

Friday afternoon, he sent a mass email urging his voters to register for the demonstrations scheduled for Saturday, to counter the military parade that Trump holds in Washington. “Please introduce yourself and talk about what’s going on,” wrote Padilla. “We cannot allow the Trump administration to intimidate us in silence.”