Where the partisan divide comes from

The halls of Congress aren’t as hateful as you might think. I witnessed plenty of bipartisanship firsthand on Capitol Hill. Sen. Barrasso shared a laugh with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) during an Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing when the chairman forgot to reconvene the meeting. I saw Republican and Democrat senators mingling on the Senate floor, exchanging smiles and pleasantries like old friends instead of political rivals. And outside the office, there’s the annual Congressional Baseball Game for Charity, a bipartisan tradition since 1909.

The entire U.S. Capitol was buzzing the day the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. I was there for it. I stood at the window with my fellow staffers in the office of U.S. Sen. John Barrasso (R., Wyo.), watching protestors march up Constitution Avenue toward the Supreme Court Building on First Street. We closely monitored our emails, receiving instructions from U.S. Capitol Police who told us not to bring anyone, whether they were on official business or not, onto Capitol grounds. We were instructed to avoid the Supreme Court and keep our congressional badges concealed as we exited the Dirksen Senate Office Building, lest protestors become violent.