The California Democratic Senator Alex Padilla continued to defend himself and refuting the Trump administration statements that “the press conference of the National Secretary of National Security Kristi Noem” crashed “before the federal officers pushed him out of the room, pushed him to the floor and spon it.
Padilla, the main Democrat of the Subcommittee of the Judicial Committee of the Senate on immigration, citizenship and border security, provided more details about the incident on Thursday night during a interview In MSNBC, in which he said it was not a threat and that he had simply raised his voice to ask a question.
The senator said he did not break into the press conference, as Noem alleged it, but was in the federal building for scheduled information approved with representatives of the North Command. He said the meeting was delayed the Noem press conference in a nearby room, where he was arguing for the use of the National Guard by the National Guard Administration to respond to the protests about the repression of immigration of President Donald Trump.
Padilla said he decided to listen to Noem’s press conference and asked the National Guard member and the FBI agent who escorted him if he could go.
The Senator of California, Alex Padilla, is pushed to the ground and handcuffed during a press conference held by the National Secretary of National Security Kristi Noem in Los Angeles, on June 12, 2025.
The US Senator’s office Alex Padilla
“We are, all the time, to be escorted in this federal building by someone from the National Guard, someone from the FBI. I have gone through a projection. This is a federal building. And so, I say: ‘We are going to listen to the press conference.’ They accompany me to that room,” Padilla told MSNBC.
“The people who escort me in the building attributed me. I didn’t even open the door. The door was open to me. And I spent a few minutes in the back of the room just listening until the rhetoric, the political rhetoric had to be too much to drink. Then, I spoke,” he added.
During his press conference, Noem said he was going to “free” Los Angeles “from the socialists and the leadership that this governor and mayor have placed in this country and this city.”
Padilla told MSNBC that he felt he needed to talk, said he presented himself and began asking a question before the officers expelled him from the room while the news cameras, the reporters and spectators recorded the incident.
Senator Alex Padilla, Democrat of California, who interrupted a press conference held by the United States National Security Secretary Kristi Noem, is eliminated from the place, in Los Angeles, on June 12, 2025.
ETIENNE LAURENT/AP
Noem said the police reacted as they did because Padilla came to her without identifying. She told Fox News on Thursday that nobody knew who he was and that he was “moving forward.”
The video of the incident captures Padilla identifying himself and saying that he wanted to ask a question while pushing out of the room; It is not clear in the video if it was identified before that point, even when it went forward to the podium. Padilla carried a navy blue pole with a small logo of the US Senate., But was covered under a navy blue jacket. He said he did not carry a security pin of the United States Senate at the time of the incident.
Senator Alex Padilla, Democrat of California, who interrupted a press conference held by the United States National Security Secretary Kristi Noem, is eliminated from the place, in Los Angeles, on June 12, 2025.
AUDE GUERrucci/Reuters
After he was quickly released, he and Noem had a private conversation for “10-15 minutes” after the incident, according to the senator and the secretary.
Noem said Padilla will probably not be charged.
The White House Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said Thursday that Padilla should “be ashamed of her childhood behavior.”
“He crashed in the middle of an official press conference held by a cabinet secretary, launched recklessly towards the podium where @Sec_noem was talking, and then refused to leave the room and follow the instructions of the agents of the law,” Leavitt, “Leavitt Posted in X.
The outraged Democratic senators quickly arrived at Padilla’s defense on Thursday, claiming that Noem and the officers mistreated the senator.
“This is an administration that does not respect our democracy, for our institutions, for the separation of powers, by a co-equivalent branch of the government,” said California Senator Adam Schiff.
Alaska’s Republican senator Lisa Murkowski told reporters: “I have seen that clip. It’s horrible. It’s shocking at all levels. It is not the America that I know.”
The president of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, and other Republicans punished Padilla, with Johnson coming to say that censorship may be necessary. A vote to censor has no power beyond a public sentence of the behavior of the member and does not deny the privileges of the members.
The leader of the majority, the senator, John Thune, told journalists on Thursday night that he had spoken with Padilla and the Senate sergeant in Arms E had tried to reach Noem in an effort to gather the facts.
Senator Alex Padilla, Democrat of California, speaks with journalists after he was withdrawn by force after interrupting a press conference held by the National Secretary of National Security Kristi Noem, in Los Angeles, on June 12, 2025.
Patrick T. Fallon/AFP through Getty Images
“We want to obtain the complete scope of what happened and do what we would do in any incident like this that involves a senator, that is, try to collect all the relevant information,” he said.
When asked if he thought what happened was appropriate based on what he had seen so far, Thune said: “That is all I have to say.”
