Michigan State Legislators have passed bills that will allow them to have police protection and conceal their home addresses

Last week, the Michigan State House and State Senate voted to adopt HB 5505, which will provide increased security for state legislators.

Michigan legislators have their own police force at the Lansing State Capitol, but now they will be able to have those same security officers to protect their families, even when they are in public and not at work as state legislators.

A recent MLive article entitled, Why Michigan lawmakers are beefing up their own security force as political violence surges, where several state lawmakers are justifying these decisions to use their own police force.

House Speaker Matt Hall was cited as talking about the Minnesota legislators that were killed in June, along with the killing of Charlie Kirk. The MLive article then states:

Michigan has seen threats against politicians as well, including recent bomb threats to the homes of state Sen. Jeremy Moss, D-Southfield, and Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist. Hall’s office also pointed to protesters demonstrating outside the home of state Rep. Angela Rigas, R-Caledonia, last month.

This paragraph is talking about bomb threats against elected officials, but then says, “Hall’s office also pointed to protesters demonstrating outside the home of state Rep. Angela Rigas, R-Caledonia, last month.” For the MLive reporter to conflate bomb threats with people showing up at the home of Rep. Rigas is patently absurd. I say this, because I was a participant in the protest outside of Rep. Rigas’s home. This protest was a non-violent protest, where people came to the home of Rep. Rigas because she co-sponsored legislation that would criminalize anyone providing assistance/support to undocumented immigrants. During that protest people chanted and a few knocked on her door to have a conversation about her co-sponsorship that would punish people for being in solidarity with undocumented immigrants. Since Rep. Rigas refuse to talk with people, they left a document for her to sign on the front door.

In addition, state legislators also passed a bill to conceal their employment, property addresses and other personal information from public view, according to a separate MLive article. State legislators argued that concealing this information is a direct response to threats against politicians.

While I don’t doubt that some politicians are concerned about their safety, there are several reasons why I believe that the public is unhappy with state legislators. First, when activists or other organized efforts to engage politicians at the state level, rarely are state legislators present. More often than not people only have an opportunity to speak with staff of elected officials and they generally just take down people’s comments and concerns, but never address the reasons why people show up to the offices of elected officials.

Second, more and more elected officials do not hold in person public meetings, which minimizes any chance for people they represent to directly engage these politicians. When they do hold public meetings it is always organized to benefit the politicians. Quite often people have to register to attend a public meeting with a legislator and only then will the location of the meeting be revealed. Once the meeting starts, most politicians talk at length about what they are doing before allowing the public to speak. When the public finally gets a chance to speak they often have to write their questions on a card, which allows the staff of legislators to screen questions.

Third, the lack of availability to the public as stated in the previous points, while important, are not as significant as the issue that more and more people believe that politicians do not represent their interests, or worse, they are passing bills that will do harm to their constituents. This was exactly why people showed up to the home of Rep. Rigas, because she co-sponsored legislation that would criminalize acts of solidarity and compassion directed at undocumented immigrants.

People are pissed and disillusioned with electoral politics, especially when it seems to primarily perpetuate business as usual. And when I say business as usual I mean politics that serves the interest of the rich and not the majority of people. State legislators can pass all the bills they want to protect themselves, but the best way for state legislators to reduce public outrage directed at them would be to adopt policies that benefit working class people and families.