OPINION:
One day, we will all remember where we each were on Sept. 30, 2023. On that fateful Saturday afternoon, democracy itself trembled as Rep. Jamaal Bowman, New York Democrat, set off a fire alarm in the Cannon House Office Building in a brazen but unsuccessful attempt to interfere with Republicans who were trying to pass a continuing resolution to keep the federal government open.
When Mr. Bowman pulled the lever of a bright red box labeled “FIRE,” klaxons sounded and bright lights flashed, triggering an evacuation during the pivotal vote. He asserted in a statement that this was just an honest blunder.
“I am embarrassed to admit,” he wrote, “that I activated the fire alarm, mistakenly thinking it would open the door” as he was rushing to vote on the measure.
It’s hard to believe that Mr. Bowman, an accomplished educator who served for a decade as a middle school principal in the Bronx, could be unfamiliar with the mechanisms of a fire drill. Even if one were to assume he wasn’t paying attention at school, the Capitol itself conducts regular evacuation exercises. And of course, there’s nothing ambiguous about the purpose of the bright red box that he activated.
While Mr. Bowman denies attempting to delay any vote, we learned from the left’s ceaseless prosecution of Jan. 6 protesters that obstruction of a meeting of Congress is a crime so grave that the FBI has been compelled to pursue over 1,100 federal prosecutions.
It certainly didn’t matter to those advocating heavy sentences for Jan. 6 protesters — including Mr. Bowman — that many had entered the Capitol after the electoral count proceeding had adjourned. Nor did it matter that others, such as Jacob Chansley, caused no damage. The man derisively labeled the “QAnon Shaman” served a 27-month sentence largely because he wore a distinct costume that attracted media attention.
Mr. Bowman is among those who called for the book to be thrown at those protesters, introducing a resolution to create a national day to conjure up memories of the regrettable Capitol fracas. Last December, he even called for expulsion of one of his colleagues, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, for making a jest about organizing the Jan. 6 squabble. As Mr. Bowman quoted the Georgia Republican, he conveniently left out the part where she explained, “That’s the joke.”
Mr. Bowman thundered, “Marjorie Taylor Greene is an enemy to the Constitution and of our country, and she should be expelled from Congress.”
Now it is Mr. Bowman who faces potential expulsion — not for a joke, but for actions that would result in severe consequences for anyone from a different political party.
And he is not alone. An individual even more deeply involved in condemning Jan. 6 protesters found himself in even hotter water last week.
Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Douglas Scruggs was booked in a Florida jail on charges of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and armed burglary. Video of an apparent road-rage incident appears to show the 38-year-old former Justice Department official stabbing the driver of another vehicle.
Mr. Scruggs was released the same day he was arrested — a luxury denied to many of the political protesters he incarcerated.
It goes without saying that Mr. Scruggs and Mr. Bowman are entitled to the presumption that there’s an innocent explanation for their conduct. But that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be held to the exact standards they advocated when it was their political opponents who faced charges.
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