Illinois Congressman Brad Schneider is the third Democrat to test positive for the coronavirus in the wake of last Wednesday's riot inside the Capitol building.
In a statement on his COVID test, Schneider blames President Trump for "inciting" the violent protests, and he directs blame at Republicans who refused to wear masks.
“Last Wednesday, after narrowly escaping a violent mob incited by the President of the United States to attack the Capitol and its occupants, I was forced to spend several hours in a secure but confined location with dozens of other Members of Congress. Several Republican lawmakers in the room adamantly refused to wear a mask, as demonstrated in video from Punchbowl News, even when politely asked by their colleagues," he writes. "Today, I am now in strict isolation, worried that I have risked my wife’s health and angry at the selfishness and arrogance of the anti-maskers who put their own contempt and disregard for decency ahead of the health and safety of their colleagues and our staff."
Schneider added that lawmakers who continue to "flout public health guidance should be sanctioned and immediately removed from the House floor by the Sergeant at Arms for their reckless endangerment of their colleagues."
A third Dem tests positive and blames maskless Rs. “I am now in strict isolation, worried that I have risked my wife’s health and angry at the selfishness and arrogance of the anti-maskers who put their own contempt and disregard for decency ahead of the health” of colleagues pic.twitter.com/xCPiCdeJV0
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) January 12, 2021
His positive test comes after Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) claimed that her COVID-19 case is the "result after being locked down in a secured room at the Capitol where several Republicans not only cruelly refused to wear a mask but recklessly mocked colleagues and staff who offered them one." Video of the congresswoman, however, shows that she herself was not wearing a mask at points during the Capitol breach.
Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, a 75-year-old cancer survivor, is the third lawmaker to have tested positive.