Montana Sen. Sheehy involved in physical altercation between Capitol police and protester

Montana's junior Sen. Tim Sheehy rushed into a physical altercation during a committee hearing Wednesday when the Capitol police were attempting to remove a protester.

A video posted to X, formerly Twitter, shows Sheehy joining three U.S. Capitol Police officers in an attempt to remove Brian McGinnis, a Marine veteran and Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate in North Carolina. McGinnis appeared to be protesting the joint U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran during a meeting of the Senate Committee on Armed Services, of which Sheehy is a member.

In the social media video Sheehy, a former Navy SEAL, can be seen grabbing and pulling the legs of McGinnis as the protester hangs on to the door frame. At some point during the altercation, McGinnis's arm takes an unnatural position and soon after that the altercation calms down and attention turns to McGinnis' hand lodged in the door frame. Sheehy walks away while Capitol police address the situation more closely. People in the room begin yelling about the man's potential injury, although no reports had been confirmed by press time.

"Capitol Police were attempting to remove an unhinged protester from the Armed Services hearing. He was fighting back. I decided to help out and deescalate the situation," Sheehy, 40, said in a social media post. "This gentleman came to the Capitol looking for a confrontation, and he got one. I hope he gets the help he needs without causing further violence."

Sheehy's office did not immediately respond to request for comment Wednesday but issued a statement from Capitol police noting McGinnis has since been charged with three counts of assault on a police officer, three counts of resisting arrest, obstructing and others.

“This afternoon, an unruly man who started to illegally protest during a hearing, put everyone in a dangerous position by violently resisting and fighting our officer’s attempts to remove him from the room," the statement read. "The outburst happened just before 3:00 p.m., during a hearing inside the Hart Senate Office Building. Three officers had to be treated for injuries by DC Fire & EMS. The suspect, who got his own arm stuck in a door to resist our officers and force his way back into the hearing room, was also treated.”

The social media video does not include footage of what precipitated this event or what led Sheehy to get involved, though less than an hour into Wednesday's hearing a voice can be heard yelling in the background of the official stream of the subcommittee meeting.

"Israel is the reason for this war!" a voice, likely McGinnis's, yelled off camera.

After roughly 30 seconds of yelling, the stream shows Sheehy get out of his chair and walk toward the back of the room. In all, the yelling lasted only about two minutes.

Before the meeting convened, McGinnis posted a video to his own social media saying that he was in Washington, D.C., to "speak out against the Senate and ask why they are going to send our men and women into harm's way when our elected officials said there would be no world war."

McGinnis did not immediately respond to request for comment.

In 2016, then-Montana Attorney General Tim Fox subdued a man at a state policy conference when he started swinging at Jason Thielman, who was Sen. Steve Daines' chief of staff. Thielman was also integral in getting Sheehy elected in 2024 as then-executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.