District staffers put on edge by wave of suspicious letters

WASHINGTON — Until the evacuation, it had been an ordinary day in the office, as far as working for a member of Congress goes. Phones were ringing. Mail was being opened.

“I looked over and saw white powder,” said a staffer for a House Democrat. “That’s when it hit me that, oh, this is really happening.”

Police put up caution tape, and the hazmat team arrived. “You’re always taught how to open mail safely, what to do in these situations. But the panic really set in,” the staffer said.

A flood of suspicious letters has targeted district offices around the country this month, leading to similar scenes. While some of those were intercepted by authorities, others made it to their destinations — and into the hands of junior aides tasked with opening the mail.

So far, none of the envelopes has “been determined to contain hazardous substances,” according to a memo circulated by the House Sergeant at Arms last week. That comes as a relief, according to several staffers who requested anonymity to speak candidly, but it doesn’t change the underlying hazards of the job.

District staffers serve on the front lines of dealing with the public, fielding requests — and sometimes violent threats aimed at their bosses. Members of Congress don’t answer the phones or open the mail; their aides or interns do.

After the anthrax attacks of 2001, when an intern for then-Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle opened an envelope containing the deadly powder, security officials made some changes. Mail is now screened offsite when it’s addressed to lawmakers’ main offices in D.C., adding to the fortress-like posture of the Capitol complex, where police are stationed at every entrance.

But staffers describe a different feeling in district offices, which are scattered around the country close to where constituents live.

“There’s just always a level of uncertainty and not feeling totally safe,” said another House Democratic aide who had to evacuate this month after a suspicious letter came.

While district offices can opt to have their mail forwarded to the Capitol for screening, it takes longer, which can be a problem for caseworkers waiting to receive physical documents.

“District offices are kind of on their own island,” the staffer said. “For the D.C. office, everyone walks in through the same exact security system … but district offices can kind of operate how they want.”

‘Real acts of violence’

Mail is still a source of anxiety for district staffers, even in the digital age. Last year, for example, a powder-filled envelope prompted an evacuation at one of Rep. Nick Langworthy’s offices, the New York Republican posted at the time.

October’s wave of letters is notable for its scope; at least several dozen House Democrats have announced they were targets, along with senators on both sides of the aisle and election officials in multiple states as the midterms approach. No suspect had yet to be named in the spree as of Tuesday afternoon, though a man now faces charges in Illinois for a smaller batch of mailings that authorities said were laced with harmless salt.

Such copycat attempts aren’t reassuring, and staffers point to other things that have left them on edge. In 2024, a man set part of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ Burlington, Vt., office on fire. A year earlier, a constituent entered then-Rep. Gerry Connolly’s district office in Fairfax with a baseball bat, injuring two aides, including an intern on her first day of work.

Rep. James Walkinshaw, D-Va., was Connolly’s chief of staff for several years and felt “a steady drumbeat of not just increased threats, but real acts of violence against members of Congress and staff,” he said.

While he no longer worked for Connolly at the time of the 2023 attack, Walkinshaw remained close with him and many of his staffers. Now that he’s a member of Congress himself, the incident still guides some of his choices, like keeping a buzzer system the office set up.

Tightening security is important, he said, but so is preserving public access so people can reach the elected officials who represent them. Walkinshaw said some of the hardest choices he made as a chief of staff were how to handle Connolly’s public events after a 2011 shooting in Arizona shook Congress to its core, seriously injuring then-Rep. Gabby Giffords and killing six people, including one of her staffers.

“How far in advance do we advertise public events that Congressman Connolly will be attending? How do we manage security if we advertise those events? Do we need to limit those events for a period of time?” he remembers thinking, weighing the risk of copycat attacks.

‘Double-edged sword’

Working in the district instead of D.C. can be a “double-edged sword,” according to Anne Meeker, once a staffer herself and now executive director of the Constituent Service Institute, a group that highlights the importance of casework.

“On the one hand, you are closer to constituents in ways that can be really rewarding. On the other hand, you are closer to constituents in a way that can sometimes be really threatening,” she said.

Meeker said as the 120th Congress approaches, the “first thing” members can do is decide where to lease local office space, whether in a storefront or a government building guarded by metal detectors.

“There’s a lot of complicated trade-offs,” she said. “Do you want to be in a federal building where you’re behind a level of security? Well, then that’s probably going to make it a little bit more difficult for constituents to access you. There’s an intimidation factor.”

It takes discipline, but staff can make a habit of staying vigilant, she said.

“If you have a mail hood, then the place and time to use a mail hood is every day, and not after you already know that there’s an envelope coming,” Meeker said.

One Democratic staffer who spoke to Roll Call said a mail hood — which aims to prevent the spread of airborne toxins — was used in their office but no one noticed the powder until the letter was removed. Another said while their office was not using a mail hood, an intern spotted a suspicious return address that matched warnings issued by House security officials. A staffer wearing gloves took the unopened envelope to a separate room and local police were called.

Beyond the mail, locked doors and buzzer systems have provided some reassurance.

“That has helped us a lot, because there have been times in the past where people would storm in, and then before you can even look up, someone’s screaming in your face,” one of the staffers said, adding that news of the 2023 attack on Connolly’s office inspired the change.

Over the past several years, members of Congress have boosted money for their own safety, with appropriators last year touting $203.5 million in funding aimed at shoring up protections after the assassination of both a Minnesota state lawmaker and conservative activist Charlie Kirk. Last fall, Sergeant at Arms William McFarland announced a mobile duress system and up to $20,000 a month for each member of the House to pay for personal security while they’re off the Hill.

But many of those recent efforts have focused on protecting members, rather than their staff, and more money isn’t always a magic bullet. Some fear that dealing with a constant stream of threats, even if they turn out to be hoaxes, will take its toll and push young people away from public service.

Rep. Eugene Vindman, D-Va., whose district office was evacuated this month after receiving one of the suspicious letters, described his staffers as “young, dedicated professionals.”

“They didn’t sign up to get intimidated or threatened with some sort of chemical, biological agent,” he said. “Many folks can do better in the private sector than they could do in the federal government — and so I think from elected officials to staff, this is going to have an impact on recruiting.”