By Melissa Nann Burke, mburke@detroitnews.com
Washington ― Threats to members of Michigan’s congressional delegation in both parties surged this year, prompting lawmakers to change or boost their security measures to guard their safety and that of their families.
One lawmaker now religiously posts police cars outside his events, and another added a security escort when he marches in parades. Other lawmakers moved speeches indoors, and one is relocating an office with exposed, sidewalk-level windows to a higher floor over safety concerns.
In addition to death threats, lawmakers were rattled by the targeted outdoor killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk in September and the assassination of a Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband in their home in June. The accused Minnesota suspect included the names of prominent Michigan Democrats in notes he wrote that were reviewed by law enforcement.
The escalating situation has left lawmakers on edge, with House Democratic leaders proposing to allow lawmakers to hire armed staffers to shadow them while back home, away from the highly guarded Capitol campus, the Washington publication Semafor reported this month.
“It’s a sad situation that anyone on any political side views political violence as acceptable,” said Rep. Bill Huizenga, a Holland Republican. “Whether it’s colleagues of mine or whether it’s Charlie Kirk or Trump or anybody, this should not be acceptable.”
Kirk’s killing “substantiated the fact it’s crazy out there,” said U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg, a Tipton Republican and the delegation’s most senior member.
“We need to make it very clear: We’re all taking action to make sure that not only as a member, I am protected, my family is protected, but also the people that come to my town halls or meetings are protected, as well.”
The number of credible threats against members of Congress more than doubled from about 3,940 in 2017 to nearly 9,500 last year, as tracked by U.S. Capitol Police. The number of threats in 2025 had exceeded 14,000 as of November, according to Rep. Lisa McClain of Bruce Township, chair of the House Republican Conference.
“It’s a real problem on both sides of the aisle,” McClain said. “You know it has to be bad when Democrats who hate guns are asking for armed staffers.”
U.S. Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a Holly Democrat, estimated receiving close to 1,000 threats in the days after President Donald Trump said this month that she should be arrested and hanged for sedition over a video that she made with other Democrats urging military and intelligence community professionals not to follow illegal orders.
Slotkin’s office later released audio clips of several threats left on her voicemail:
“I can eat popcorn while I watch you get executed for treason. God, I’m going to pray for that. Tick tock,” one man said on the recorded line.
“I’d love to see you hanging from a tree, bleeding out, so I can piss on your grave,” another said.
“You need to be hung or stood up against a wall and shot in the damn face, televised on TV live for the entire world to see,” said a message from another caller.
Slotkin was given a 24-7 security detail with a Capitol Police officer to follow her wherever she goes ― an unusual arrangement for a U.S. senator. A Slotkin aide said the audio clips were just the “tip of the iceberg,” with the office still getting half a dozen threatening calls a day weeks later.
“They’ve targeted my family, my parents. They’ve targeted my home with bomb threats. … It is just on and on and on,” Slotkin said on MS Now.
“I would not wish this on someone, whether they’re my party or another party. I would never want this for anyone else.”
Toxic partisanship
Huizenga said Trump’s posts about Slotkin and the other Democrats in the controversial video “is not rhetoric that I think is helpful.”
“I have my problems both with what she did, as well as policy-wise,” Huizenga said of Slotkin. “But you know, that’s not how we handle this here in the United States. It’s at the ballot box.”
Amid toxic partisanship, lawmakers have blamed the other party in part for the increase in threats.
“When you have a president of the United States calling out people and thinking that they should be the target of political violence, it’s an incredibly dangerous situation that we’re in,” said Sen. Gary Peters, a Bloomfield Township Democrat.
McClain contended that Democrats have fueled the heightened threat environment by demonizing police and immigration enforcement agents and disrespecting law and order and the chain of command.
“No one should be surprised that we’ve ended up here,” McClain said.
“When you get so many threats on a weekly basis, you become numb to them right up into the point that ― like we saw in Minnesota ― two people get shot, right? That’s the real danger. And I believe in freedom of speech, but freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from consequences.”
McClain said she often sees an uptick in threats after going on CNN or other “liberal” outlets.
Walberg, chair of the House Education and Workforce Committee, said politicians sometimes will receive increased threats because of their rhetoric. But that doesn’t entirely explain the trend.
“Members, like me, who are not known for making similar statements have seen an increase in threats during this term of office,” he said. “Whether that comes from being a member of the party of Trump or being a chairman of a committee, I don’t know.”
Some lawmakers got more threats after taking on leadership posts or running for higher office. After Capitol Police flagged the heightened threat environment this year, Rep. Tom Barrett, a Charlotte Republican, said he opted to decline to host in-person town halls this year.
“That’s unfortunate,” he said. “We have to get back to a point where we can debate effectively, without risk of personal harm to people.”
Democratic Rep. Debbie Dingell of Ann Arbor agreed, lamenting that Americans are normalizing political violence and pleading for all sides to lower the temperature.
“I’m grateful for law enforcement in both Washington and Michigan. I try to use common sense and get my job done,” said Dingell, who was also named in the papers of the Minnesota shooting suspect.
“I listen to what experts say: You try to not go to the same place at the same time every week. I’m aware of my surroundings. But I’m just not going to be someone who is going to be living in a bubble.”
Increased security budgets
Threats of violence are forwarded to U.S. Capitol Police, the FBI or local law enforcement for investigation and follow up. Suspects charged in connection with such incidents have been sentenced to jail time in recent years, though free speech protections at times can make it hard for law enforcement to intervene unless a clear threat is made.
“We would contact the FBI or Capitol Police, and they’d make a visit and knock on someone’s door,” said former U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, a St. Joseph Republican inundated with threats after voting for the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure bill and later for Trump’s impeachment.
“That usually would scare them to cease and desist when they realized it’s a federal crime. But it didn’t always work.”
Upton, who represented southwest Michigan in Congress for 36 years, lost a staffer from his Kalamazoo office who quit because the calls were so uncivil.
“She just couldn’t take it,” he recalled.
Candidates for Congress also deal with serious threats. The state police bomb squad responded in September to a threat made on the Southfield home of state Sen. Jeremy Moss, a Democrat running for Congress in the 11th District in Oakland County.
And An Oakland University student was investigated in October for a social media post that Oakland County Republicans said was “openly calling for the execution of a Republican congressional candidate,” Michael Steger.
James Hogge, communications director for Rep. Jack Bergman, R-Watersmeet, got a personal protection order against a constituent who alarmed him by showing up at Hogge’s best friend’s funeral in Michigan in 2023.
The man, who taught at Interlochen Center for the Arts, had repeatedly contacted Hogge via social media. At first, he refused to leave the memorial because he was upset with the congressman, demanding to vent his complaints to his spokesman, Hogge recalled.
After that, a sheriff’s deputy sat in Hogge’s driveway for three days as a precaution, he said. The incident prompted him to get his concealed pistol license.
“It’s become a norm now to act like a jerk,” Bergman said. “It’s become a norm to get in people’s faces.”
Congress approved $30 million for lawmaker security as part of the short-term spending bill approved in November, intended in part to reimburse local law enforcement agencies for providing security to members of Congress back home.
In the wake of Kirk’s killing, the Senate approved a rule change allowing senators to use their office budgets for personal security measures. And House leaders recently doubled the personal security allowance for each lawmaker to $20,000 a month, McClain said.
Members of Congress have been allowed to use campaign money to pay for security, including bodyguards, since 2021 ― expenses that quickly add up.
U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a Detroit Democrat, spent more than $43,000 on security-related expenses and transportation just this year, according to campaign finance reports through Sept. 30. Tlaib, the only Palestinian American in Congress, has drawn death threats since her election in 2018.
While threats to her and her staff aren’t new, she sent an email to supporters in September, saying the campaign was taking increased measures to ensure safety. That includes a security detail and driver accompanying Tlaib whenever she’s traveling around her district, pushing the security budget to $1,000 a day, according to the email.
The change was prompted by Tlaib’s name appearing on the accused Minnesota shooter’s list, according to the email, which was sent a couple of weeks after Kirk’s assassination in Utah.
“I’ve been speaking out against political violence for years, even introducing legislation to stop violence against women in politics,” Tlaib wrote. “But this moment feels different, and we’re taking it seriously.”
Another Detroit Democrat, two-term Rep. Shri Thanedar, is wary of hiring security, despite what he said is a tenfold increase in threats since he introduced impeachment measures against Trump earlier this year and against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth this month.
Thanedar, an immigrant from India, said he’s been approached in the grocery store, at an airport and on Detroit’s Riverwalk by people who are verbally abusive or threatening, with some telling him to “go back where you came from.”
But he is concerned that a security detail would discourage constituents who want to bring him genuine concerns or feedback.
“I don’t want a detail around me. It may have to change, but I have trying to resist it. Because I just want to be with people. I represent people. I can’t do my job if I have to be that guarded all the time,” Thanedar said.
“Look, a person who is bent on doing something harmful could succeed, despite all the security, right? Having said that, I do occasionally have security at events, but I try to minimize it.”
Dingell said she’ll never take on a security detail.
“I don’t believe in entourages, and I’m not going to start having one,” she said. “It’s just not who I am.”
