WASHINGTON, DC –  Upon press reports of the Trump Department of Justice’s decision to charge Congresswoman LaMonica McIver with “assaulting, impeding, and interfering with law enforcement” during an oversight visit to an immigration detention center in her home state of New Jersey, Praveen Fernandes, Vice President of the Constitutional Accountability Center, issued the following statement:

Our Constitution provides Congress with the power to conduct oversight, and Members of Congress have the power and duty to conduct oversight over key issues that affect the American public, including their constituents. While the facts are still emerging, it is difficult to understand this charge against Congresswoman McIver—particularly when seen as part of a pattern of charging or threatening to charge perceived political opponents of President Trump—as anything but another page taken from the authoritarian playbook.

We should all be worried if publicly elected officials are being intimidated simply for taking their oaths of office seriously and doing the jobs they were elected to do. The danger of executive power wielded without strong checks and balances concerned the Framers of the Constitution when our national charter was adopted, and that danger should concern all of us today. If the Trump administration is able to do this to a sitting member of Congress performing an official duty, what protects everyday Americans?