Kansas senators give Capitol tour, pose for photos with members of ‘People’s Convoy’
Both of Kansas’ U.S. senators, Roger Marshall and Jerry Moran, met in the U.S. Capitol last week with members of the “People’s Convoy,” a group of truckers and their supporters who drove across the country to protest public health measures to limit the spread of COVID-19.
Marshall gave the group a guided tour of the Capitol on March 9 and they stopped by Moran’s office, where they took a picture. Marshall’s office said the group of around 13 people were all from Kansas.
Tours of the Capitol have been limited over the past two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but in December the sergeant-at-arms began allowing guided tours for small groups in the Senate side of the building. Marshall’s office said the tour complied with the Senate’s policies.
Politico reported Wednesday that the tour prompted a senior congressional staffer to make a report to the Department of Justice.
“Who would have known that taking a friendly group of hardworking American truckers, including Kansans, on a public tour of their nation’s Capitol building would cause such a stir,” Marshall said. “Let’s not forget, these are the essential workers who showed up to work every day in the earliest months of the pandemic to deliver goods and food to Americans.”
U.S. Capitol Police put up a security fence surrounding the Capitol ahead of the State of the Union, in part due to concerns about the convoy. Some members of the trucker convoys have connections to people who entered the Capitol on Jan. 6.
The U.S. Capitol Police declined to comment on the tour.
Marshall dismissed the notion that there were any security concerns from showing the truckers around the Capitol.
“These are some of the the greatest patriots I’ve ever met,” Marshall told The Star. “I don’t know where this buildup is of concern about them.”
The “People’s Convoy” — inspired by protests by truckers in Canada that clogged up roads in Ottawa in part of a weekslong protest — traveled from Southern California to Washington, D.C. Similar convoys have converged on the capital with varying degrees of success. One that passed through Kansas City consisted of only three tractor-trailers.
Marshall said he met some of the Kansas truckers in Salina, where the town raised $10,000 worth of goods for their trip.
For the past two weeks members of the convoy have been staying in Maryland, where they’ve set up a festival-like campground. The group was partially denied a permit for a two-week protest on the National Mall because it conflicted with other permits, according to the Washington Post.
The convoy has been making near-daily trips on the beltway, but on Monday the trucks entered the capital as local police blocked the exits leading to downtown. The detour backed up traffic for thousands of commuters.
The group is protesting a bevy of COVID-19 restrictions, despite the loosening of vaccine and mask mandates across the country. They’re still pushing back on restrictions requiring masks on airplanes and other forms of public transit and some COVID-19 vaccine requirements, like the one imposed by the U.S. military.
Marshall has been a vocal advocate for lifting COVID-19 restrictions in the U.S. Senate. Earlier this month he was able to pass two resolutions through the Senate — one that would block a Biden administration vaccine requirement for health care workers and one that would end the current State of Emergency for COVID-19. Both still would have to be approved by the House of Representatives.
Marshall and Moran are not the only politicians who have met with members of the “People’s Convoy.” Last week Missouri Rep. Billy Long, who is running for U.S. Senate, participated in a press conference outside the Capitol with a group called the Moms Truckin’ for Freedom, where he criticized the ongoing mask mandate on airplanes. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz rode in the convoy around the city.
Marshall said he, too, was invited to ride in one of the trucks, but the timing did not work out.
This story was originally published March 16, 2022 at 1:51 PM.