Don’t Ride The Elevator With This Congresswoman

by Stuart Shapiro

The buildings of Congress have what are known as “Members Only” elevators.  They are designed to ensure that Representatives can get to the floor quickly for a vote when necessary.  Rep. Virginia Foxx takes the “Members Only” thing pretty seriously.  Last week:

The lawmaker, who was recently elected to a House GOP leadership post, asked for whom the pair worked. Then she turned to the female staffer, who had no clue she was on board what was soon to be the elevator ride of doom.

Foxx said to the staffer, “This is a ‘members-only’ elevator; can you read?” She then demanded the staffer’s name before the elevator stopped after going just one more floor up. “Get out here,” Foxx supposedly commanded.

Before our insider and the berated staffer exited, the politician exclaimed, “What does this sign say? It says, ‘Members of Congress only.’ ”

Foxx’s office called the reports an exaggeration.  But now, others have come forward:

But after seeing a parcel deliveryman hop on one of the lifts in the Longworth House Office Building, our spy stepped on, too. The deliveryman got off on the next floor, and that’s when Foxx got on.

Our insider says the congresswoman asked if he had seen the “members-only” sign outside the elevator before demanding his name and the office he worked for. “She was very intimidating, especially for a brand-new intern,” he tells ITK.

As our elevator rider describes it, “She walked up to a [Capitol] police officer and told on me for riding on her elevator, and he was as dumbfounded as I was.”

Glad to see Foxx has her priorities straight.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.