Republicans censure Bowman for falsely pulling fire alarm in House office building

Rep. Jamaal Bowman's House colleagues formally scolded him on Thursday with a mostly party-line vote to censure the Yonkers Democrat for pulling a fire alarm in a congressional office building in September.

The House, which already had debated the Republican censure resolution before holding a procedural vote on it one day earlier, passed it with no further remarks before casting the 214-191 vote. Just three Democrats joined Republicans in support. No GOP members opposed the censure.

Bowman pulled the alarm near an exit in the Cannon House Office Building on Sept. 30 during a chaotic scramble to vote on a stopgap funding measure to avoid a government shutdown that night. Republican leaders had sprung the proposal that morning and called an immediate vote.

Bowman insists he yanked the alarm by accident, after finding his usual exit locked as he raced to the Capitol to cast his vote. Republicans have scoffed at that explanation as implausible and accused the former middle school principal of pulling a serious prank to try to delay the vote.

Bowman pleaded guilty in October to falsely pulling a fire alarm, agreeing to pay a $1,000 fine and write an apology to the Capitol police. The misdemeanor conviction was set to be expunged after three months if Bowman met the terms of the plea deal.

The short censure resolution against him recited the criminal offense and stated little more than that Bowman had "disrupted the work of the Congress as a vote was underway on the floor of the House."

No blowback: Jamaal Bowman pulled fire alarm in Washington. How did Westchester react?

In an impassioned floor speech on Wednesday, Bowman said he had taken responsibility for his mistake and defended his three-year record in Congress. He accused Republicans of rehashing the incident for political gain while neglecting more important matters, saying the "Republican Party is deeply unserious and unable to legislate."

Bowman is the third Democrat to be censured in the Republican-led House this year, after Reps. Adam Schiff of California and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan. A censure, which used to be a rare practice, is a purely symbolic rebuke that has no effect on a member's standing in the House.

The bipartisan House Ethics Committee announced last month that it had examined the fire-alarm incident and that a majority decided it warranted no further investigation. The ten-member panel has five Republicans and five Democrats.

Bowman's censure came the same week that a serious primary challenger emerged to contest his bid for a third term next year. Westchester County Executive George Latimer filed federal paperwork to enter the race on Monday and launched his campaign with a video address two days later.

Chris McKenna covers government and politics for The Journal News and USA Today Network. Reach him at cmckenna@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Jamaal Bowman censured by House GOP over fire alarm pull