Anger over health-care reform spurs rise in threats against Congress members

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FBI arrests man for alleged Pelosi threats

A California man angry about health care reform allegedly made threatening and harassing phone calls to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, including at least one call in which he got through and spoke to her directly, law enforcement officials said.

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The threats have come at home and at work, online, on the phone and in person.

This week, Rep. Stephen I. Cohen (D-Tenn.) received hostile e-mails to his Cohen for Congress campaign Web site, an incident that was reported to the Capitol Police and the FBI office in Memphis. One e-mail said, "If our tea parties had hoods, we would burn your [expletive] on a cross on the White House front lawn," according to Cohen's chief of staff.

A propane gas line was cut in March at the Charlottesville home of Rep. Tom Perriello's (D-Va.) brother after a self-identified "tea party" activist posted the address on the Internet and said it was the congressman's house.

A brick was thrown through the window of the Niagara Falls district office of Rep. Louise M. Slaughter (D-N.Y.) , and someone left her a voice mail suggesting that the children of health-reform supporters would be targeted by snipers.

Rep. Bart Stupak (Mich.), the leader of a bloc of antiabortion Democrats who eventually cut a deal with the Obama administration and voted for the bill, received a fax with a drawing of a noose and an anonymous voice mail saying: "You're dead. We know where you live. We'll get you."

Despite the threats, Murray and Slaughter haven't changed their public schedules, according to spokesmen, and Perriello hasn't slowed down since the vandalism at his brother's house.

"It hasn't really changed much about how we do business here in the office," said Perriello spokeswoman Jessica Barba.

She said Perriello was maintaining a "very aggressive public events schedule" with more than a dozen appearances in the past week and no security staff in tow.

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said that he had received threats before and during the health-care debate but that he's "handled them quietly."

"There's simply more anger out there about the direction of our country," Alexander said. "I see it and feel it in the public meetings I go to. But I'm going to the same places and doing the same things I always have."