FAIRFAX, Va. (DC News Now) — Congressman Gerry Connolly talked Tuesday about the attack on two staff members that took place at his office in Fairfax, noting that the psychological recovery will take much longer than the physical.
Connolly, who represents Virginia’s 11th Congressional District, was not at the office, located at 10680 Main St., when someone went there and assaulted the staff members with a metal baseball bat.
City of Fairfax police said that person was a Xuan Kha Tran Pham, 49, of Fairfax, who faces charges of Aggravated Malicious Wounding and Malicious Wounding.
Connolly said the staff members who were hurt were an outreach director whom Pham hit on her head and an intern who was there for the first day of her internship. Connolly said Pham hit her on the side with the bat.
“I think the hard work begins now. You know, we’re physically cleaning up the office. There’s blood and glass in the front part of the office,” explained Connolly. “But I think the longer-term challenges, you know, trying to recover from the trauma, the idea that you could walk into work where you’ve been working for a while, or in the case of my intern, her first day and someone comes in with a baseball bat and beats you up is very shocking.”
Connolly said he believes that there needs to be more security for district offices, noting that he talked to colleagues on the House floor, who expressed concern about their own staff members and their district offices. He added that he thinks that security is a topic that has to be discussed soon in Congress.
“My office happens to be in a commercial office building. Others are in strip malls. Some are in government facilities that do have security. But most commercial enterprises don’t. And so we have to provide what security we provide. And I don’t think, you know, after yesterday’s incident, I think, I think it exposes the vulnerability of a lot of district offices all over the country,” said Connolly.
Connolly said both of the staff members who were attacked on Monday had been released from the hospital.
“I was with them yesterday in the hospital and their families and we’re going to be checking in constantly. I think they’re doing as well as, you know, you might expect. But I think there’s, it takes time to recover from just the physicality of what happened,” Connolly stated. “It takes awhile for the brain to actually accept that somebody came in with a baseball bat and beat you up for no reason unprovoked,” said Connolly.
