A Nebraska state senator caught on video removing portraits of America’s Founders from a hallway in the state Capitol is defending her actions.
Democratic State Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh was shown on Capitol security footage taking down portraits from an exhibit celebrating the 250th anniversary of America’s founding.
The exhibit was provided by conservative nonprofit PragerU and included images of signers of the Declaration of Independence and prominent women in American history, according to Gov. Jim Pillen, who criticized the lawmaker’s actions.
“Celebrating America during our 250th year should be a moment of unity and patriotism, not divisiveness and destructive partisanship,” Pillen wrote in a post on X. “I am disappointed in this shameful and selfish bad example.”
Cavanaugh told KETV7 Omaha that she removed the portraits because she believed they violated the rules and regulations of the State Capitol and did not believe they had been approved.
She cited Rule 4.07, which limits displays to the first-floor rotunda for a one-week period in most cases and prohibits leafleting within the state Capitol or on its grounds.
“I don’t even know what the pictures were. I wasn’t really paying attention as I was taking them down. I just took them down,” Cavanaugh said, denying her actions were political. “I will say that I know that the picture that he tweeted is not one of the ones that I took down, because I saw it in a different hallway.”
The progressive lawmaker later told the Lincoln Journal Star that she tried not to damage the artwork and contacted the Nebraska State Patrol to let them know where the portraits could be found, according to the Nebraska Examiner.
The portraits were returned by 3 p.m. Wednesday, the report said.
The State Patrol said Wednesday night that no citation was issued, and no “apparent damage” was done to the art, according to the report, and returned the posters to the Capitol Commission.
After PragerU’s X account shared video of the incident, it drew more than 1 million views on the platform by Thursday.
“An elected public servant violating freedom of speech, civil discourse and (most importantly) a unified attempt to celebrate our shared history. Shameful, disappointing, dangerous,” PragerU Kids host Jill Simonian wrote in a post on X.
“What the hell?” Fox News political analyst Guy Benson wrote.
Several replies to PragerU’s post referenced Cavanaugh’s past protests in the Legislature, including chanting from the Senate floor in 2023 during debate over transgender-related legislation.
Fox News Digital reached out to Cavanaugh’s office for comment.
Prager University CEO Marissa Streit told Fox News Digital, “America’s 250th year should be an opportunity for all of us to rediscover our shared history and to reengage our shared principles. It’s too bad a radical politician in America’s heartland begun the year aimed at dividing us. As for PragerU, we’re focused on uniting the country around the shared values back up on display in the Nebraska State Capitol.”
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