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“This morning, while traveling with my family, 3 FBI agents visited me and seized my cell phone," Perry said in a statement first released by Fox News.
Perry called the seizure “banana republic tactics,” according to the Associated Press.
He says the Justice Department’s decision have the FBI conduct a warranted search was an “unnecessary and aggressive action,” according to the outlet.
Perry claims the FBI "made no attempt to contact my lawyer, who would have made arrangements for them to have my phone if that was their wish. I’m outraged — though not surprised — that the FBI under the direction of Merrick Garland’s DOJ, would seize the phone of a sitting Member of Congress.”
The phone was supposedly seized as part of the January 6 hearings, which he was subpoenaed for but has yet to appear.
“My phone contains info about my legislative and political activities, and personal/private discussions with my wife, family, constituents, and friends,” Perry said. None of this is the government’s business," he says in the statement.
As Politico's report on the statement points out, this confiscation is "not without recent precedent," as authorities seized the phone of fellow Republican, US Senator for North Carolina Richard Burr 2020 as part of an investigation into his stock-trading. It is thought that investigation is what prompted him to resign from the Senate Intelligence Committee and not run for reelection.
Perry is currently running for reelection against the Democratic candidate Shamaine Daniels. If he is reelected it would be his 6th term representing York, Harrisburg, and some of the two cities' suburbs to the US Congress, as he previously represented the area back when it was the 4th district.
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