Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., was criminally charged and an arrest warrant was issued on Wednesday for illegally pulling a fire alarm in the Cannon House Office Building on September 30.
Bowman is set to be arraigned Thursday where he will plead guilty. The crime carries a maximum penalty of six months in prison and a $1,000 fine.
According to Bowman’s office, he was able to reach a plea deal with the Democratic-run Washington, D.C. Attorney General’s office to avoid jail time.
Bowman will only pay the $1,000 fine for disrupting Congress.
“We finished our investigation,” the Capitol Police said in a statement. “Our agents gathered all the evidence, packaged it up, and sent the entire case with charges to prosecutors for their consideration.”
The fire alarm triggered an evacuation of the Capitol building just as Congress was getting ready to vote on a controversial bill to keep the government funded through November.
Bowman, who was running late to the narrow vote, pulled the alarm to intentionally delay the vote, critics claimed.
The D.C. attorney general could have charged Bowman with obstruction but chose to only charge him with one count of a false fire alarm.
A spokesman for the D.C. Attorney General’s Office said Bowman was treated like any other criminal.
“Congressman Bowman was treated like anyone else who violates the law in the District of Columbia,” the spokesman said. “He is pleading guilty and has agreed to pay the maximum fine.”
Bowman says the plea deal requires him to “stay out of trouble for three months.”
“It was a lapse of judgment if you will. … Wasn’t a conscious decision to do something wrong,” he told Fox News.
Bowman will be fingerprinted and have a mug shot taken. He surrendered to police early Thursday.
Critics blasted the plea deal as politically biased in favor of Bowman, and called him an “insurrectionist.”
BREAKING: Rep. Jamaal Bowman has been charged with one misdemeanor count of falsely pulling a fire alarm.
This is a JOKE. The crime was obstruction of congressional proceedings. That is a felony under federal law 18 U.S.C. § 1505. Up to 5 years in prison.
Bowman could have also… pic.twitter.com/eOCO6E034t
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) October 25, 2023