Harry Reid Won’t Say If Americans Should Be Forcibly Barred From Asking Him Questions

"Corruptus in Extremis"

"I don't care a straw for your newspaper articles, 

my constituents don't know how to read."

Boss Tweed

(CNSNews.com) – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) did not respond to repeated questions from CNSNews.com about whether American citizens who try to ask him a question in the Capitol hallway should be physically barred from doing so by Capitol Police--as happened recently when reporter Jason Mattera introduced himself, shook Reid’s hand, and asked him a question about how he became a millionaire on a government salary.

In several e-mails and telephone calls, CNSNews.com asked Sen. Reid’s office the following question: “Does Sen. Reid think that Americans should in any way be barred or intimidated from asking questions of members of the Senate walking in public hallways in a Senate office building?”

Reid’s office never responded.

Back on Sept. 16, a Capitol Hill police officer walking with Reid pushed Mattera into a wall, even though all Mattera did was ask Reid a question, which under the First Amendment of the Constitution any American has a right to do reports CNS News.

A plainclothes Capitol Hill policeman forcefully pushes journalist 

Jason Mattera into a wall after Mattera asked Senate Majority 

Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) a question. 

 (Photo: Daily Surge.)

As captured on videotape by one of Mattera’s colleagues,  Mattera, a journalist and author, walked along with Reid and several other people down one of the hallways in the Russell Senate Office Building.

From several feet away from Reid, Mattera said: “Hey Senator Reid. Hello, sir, let me introduce myself, Jason Mattera. (He shook Reid’s hand.) Hi.”

Mattera then asked: “How did you become so rich working in government? How does someone on a government salary most of their career accumulate your type of wealth?”

At that point, one of the men walking with Reid said to Mattera, “Are you press? Are you press?” and then physically pushed and pinned Mattera to the wall. The man, a plain-clothed Capitol Hill police officer, held Mattera and then held him longer as Mattera tried to move away.

Mattera said: “What are you doing? What are you doing holding me up like that?”

The man said: “I’m asking you a question. I’m asking you a question.”

Mattera said: “I’m Jason Mattera, author of Crapitalism. Seriously, you’re going to do this [as the man physically held hi]? Yes, I’m press. You’re going to do that to press?

“I don’t care if you’re press or not,” said the man, who then started to walk away.

“You don’t care? You’re going to rough up people like that?” said Mattera. “You don’t care if they’re press?  What’s your name, sir? What’s your name, sir? What’s your name? I’m asking a question and you’re going to rough up the press like that? That’s how you do it?”

The man at that point was walking briskly away to catch up with Senate Majority Leader Reid and did not reveal his name.

“With a net worth as high as $6.7 million—and living arrangements that include permanent accommodations at the Ritz-Carlton in Washington, D.C.—Mattera believes taxpayers deserve answers about how Senator Reid made all his earnings while living on a government salary,” reported the Daily Surge.

Mattera told CNSNews.com that the response his question elicited was “emblematic of the disgust people have for D.C. and the arrogance in thinking that a taxpayer can be roughed up for asking a question about how tax dollars are being used by someone claiming to represent them.”

The bodyguard in the video was later identified as a member of the U.S. Capitol Police.