Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., his staff and family have been the target of harassment and death threats, according to a memo released by his office on Thursday afternoon.
Voicemails shared by Tillis’ team, which were filled with profanity and fueled by discontent with President Donald Trump, reveal a frightening new reality. The senator’s senior advisor, Daniel Keylin, said ‘the volume of threats and harassment directed at members of Congress and their staff is the new normal.’
‘Yeah, Thom Tillis, afraid of death threats? Then get the f— out of office,’ one caller said in a voicemail.
Keylin said Tillis’ office in Greenville, North Carolina, received a handwritten and unsigned letter postmarked in Greensboro last month calling his staff members ‘sacrificial lambs’ and insisting they ‘signed up to be his shield.’ The anonymous writer, while reiterating ‘in no way is this a threat,’ said people are going to start ‘coming in filled with rage.’
The voicemails released by Tillis’ office express outrage over Trump’s policies and include violent threats to Tillis and his staff.
‘You are not going to destroy my country,’ one woman said. Another caller told Tillis he is ‘not one of the good guys anymore’ and said to ‘get the f— out of government.’
‘…When things get really bad, people are going to stop calling and writing. They’re going to start coming in, and they’re going to be coming in filled with rage… And you signed up to be his shield. Resign, please resign, or find a Groupon for self defense class because America’s transition to oligarchy is going to be a wild ride for us peons,’ reads the anonymous letter sent to Tillis.
The anonymous writer references ‘America’s transition to oligarchy,’ a term that has been used by the left to describe the alleged rising power of the billionaire class.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., has drawn thousands of supporters to his ‘Fighting Oligarchy’ rallies across the country, with stops in Michigan and Wisconsin this past weekend. The events are billed as an opportunity to ‘discuss how we take on the greed of the billionaire class and create a government that works for all and not just the few.’
Democrats were outraged by Trump inviting billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg to sit behind him at his inauguration inside the U.S. Capitol. Former President Joe Biden also used the term ‘oligarchy’ in his farewell address to the nation.
‘Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power, and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms, and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead,’ Biden told Americans on Jan. 13.
Two weeks after Tillis’ office received the letter, Indivisible Guilford County, a local arm of a progressive political action group, organized a protest at Tillis’ Greensboro office. While the protest’s press release encouraged peaceful signs and ‘solidarity,’ Keylin said the protesters attempted to break into Tillis’ office.
‘They angrily yanked and attempted to open the office’s locked door, yelling at Tillis’ staff to open it: ‘Come back, we see you! Open the door!’ and reminding the staff they had no way to exit their office,’ Keylin said in the memo.
Keylin said Tillis’ office received several media inquiries questioning if Tillis would attend the protests or town halls planned in Republican-held districts. Outlining years of targeted threats that have only escalated since Trump returned to office, Keylin said, ‘I imagine anyone with a modicum of sanity would understand what a silly question that is.’
The memo says that ‘out of an abundance of caution,’ law enforcement has directed the senator’s office to work from home on the days protests are planned.
‘We will not make any apologies for prioritizing the safety and security of our staff,’ Keylin said.
The memo outlines two more instances in which the North Carolina senator was subject to death threats.
‘Senator Tillis, his staff, and even his family have long been subject to threats, harassment, attempted intimidation, and verbal abuse from unstable individuals who don’t agree with his political view,’ Keylin said.
A U.S. citizen living abroad was arrested for threatening to kill Tillis and cut off the hands of his staffers in 2023, and a Minnesota man was indicted in 2022 for threatening to kill Tillis, the memo confirmed.
Protests have shut down town halls and disrupted local legislative offices in the past two months, and Republicans have opted for tele-town halls instead of in-person town halls as a result. Democrats have accused Republicans of ignoring their constituents’ concerns by avoiding in-person town halls.
Gov. Tim Walz, D-Minn., will host town halls on Friday in Republican-held congressional districts in Iowa and Nebraska ‘to lend a megaphone to the people.’ Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., has reportedly started planning her own rallies in Republican-held congressional districts as well.
MoveOn.org, which has accepted millions of dollars from billionaire George Soros and his Open Society Policy Center, announced in a press release last month that it was mobilizing resources as part of a ‘Congress Works for Us, Not Musk’ initiative ‘aimed at pressuring lawmakers to fight back against the Trump-Musk agenda.’ The group planned protests at congressional-led town halls and congressional offices.
Fox News Digital’s Julia Johnson and Andrew Mark Miller contributed to this report.