Congressman says watchdog found police entered his office for 'criminal' probe, not open door

Texas Republican Rep. Troy Nehls says a forthcoming Inspector General report will show he was "under criminal investigation" when Capitol Police officers entered his Capitol Hill office and began taking photos in November 2021.

In February, Nehls publicly disclosed that Capitol Police had told him he was not the subject to an investigation after the Nov. 20 and 22 incidents in which officers entering his office.

Nehls said Friday on the John Solomon Reports podcast that a "full report" from the Capitol Police Inspector General's Office on the matter will be released to him next week after having recently received an "executive summary" of the report. 

He alleges that on Nov. 20, a Capitol Police officer entered his office without his knowledge and photographed "confidential legislative products protected by the Speech and Debate clause” of the U.S. Constitution, purportedly on a whiteboard.

Chief J. Thomas Manger said an officer saw that Nehls' office door was left "wide open," and that if a member’s office is vacant, left open and unsecured, "officers are directed to document that and secure the office to ensure nobody can wander in and steal or do anything else nefarious," according to the newspaper Roll Call.

A couple of days later, Capitol Police personnel reportedly followed up with Nehls’ staff and determined there was no need for investigation or further action, Manger said.

Nehls said that on Nov. 22, three department intelligence officers tried to enter his office and that upon discovering that one of his staffers was present, the Capitol Police special agents, who he said were dressed like construction workers, questioned the staffer on the contents of a photograph that was taken. Nehls said the department never told him or senior staff of "their investigation," Roll Call also reports.

"What it's going to show is that the Capitol Police were trying to preserve evidence taking this picture," Nehls said Friday. "And so the IG will tell you that I was under investigation when you've got the chief of police saying I was never under investigation. I can assure you, I was under criminal investigation. So I'm looking forward to getting this report on next week."

Nehls said he was being targeted because of his public statements related to Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

"I'd been beat up, beat to hell on social media by the far left, everybody calling me an insurrectionist and everything else because they actually felt that I was the threat because of my position on J6," he said on the podcast. "I exposed J6. I exposed the Capitol Police leadership team for failing to do their damn job."

He continued, saying, "And if they would have done their job, J6 would have never ever happened. If the National Guard would have been deployed on our nation's capitol on Jan. 4, and all of the intelligence were there, January 6 would have never taken place. But there are people that wanted it to take place."

Just the News made several unsuccessful attempts Friday to speak to officials at the Capitol Police IG office. 

"They were coming after me to silence and destroy me," Nehls said Friday. "That's what [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi wants to do to guys like me. If I am a vocal critic of J6 and that leadership team, they're going to go out there and try to destroy me just like they did with Donald Trump."