Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) plans to try to block Democratic nominee and New York socialist Darializa Avila Chevalier from taking her seat in Congress if she wins the Nov. 3 election \u2014 over her saying she used the American flag as a napkin.<\/p>\n
Burchett told The Post he intends to make the unusual parliamentary move when the new Congress convenes in January \u2014 using a simple majority to prevent newly elected lawmakers from being seated before they take the oath of office.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou take an oath to uphold the Constitution, and and you\u2019re pretty much disavowing it right there. I just think we\u2019ve lost our compass,\u201d he said in an interview.<\/p>\n
Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) says he will move to block New York Democrat Darializa Avila Chevalier from being seated if she prevails in her House race. REUTERS<\/p>\n
He cited the Chevalier\u2019s incendiary flag comment<\/a>, which he called an affront to his own family\u2019s military service. His father was a World War II Marine, while his dad\u2019s brother served on a Navy destroyer.<\/p>\n But it is the memory of his maternal uncle \u2014 and a family heirloom \u2014 that most deeply connects Burchett to the flag.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m looking at a 48-star flag that hung on my uncle\u2019s casket and [he] died fighting the Nazis, and then see somebody going to get elected to Congress in New York who said they use that flag for a napkin,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought, man, that same dadgum flag hung on my uncle\u2019s casket. It\u2019s the same flag that that men and women fought and died for to free the slaves, and that\u2019s what they\u2019re using as a napkin.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we vote to seat them, is one Democrat going to say no? I\u2019m not going to vote to seat those people. Are they gonna say anything? Democrats died for this country as well as Republicans did.\u201d<\/p>\n Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) speaks to the press as he arrives to a House Republican Conference meeting in the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, Tuesday, July 21, 2026. The U.S. House of Representatives is expected to start a long recess through August after completing legislative business this week. Getty Images<\/p>\n The threat by Burchett, who flew with President Trump on Air Force One last week to Tennessee, is an early sign of the intense partisan clashes set to flare at the start of a new Congress, where Democrats are poised to make gains<\/a> and a cadre of left-wing lawmakers including Chevalier are set to yank the party to the left after winning safe-seat primaries.<\/p>\n Burchett said he would make the motion whether Republicans retain control of the House or become the minority party. \u201cI think the Democrat Party needs to . . . get some guts, and get their rudder back for the working people,\u201d he fumed.<\/p>\n Burchett\u2019s uncle on his mother\u2019s side, Roy Hicks, was wounded shortly after D-Day battling German forces in the bloody earthen embankments near Normandy known as the hedgerows. Burchett still has his uncle\u2019s Purple Heart and keeps the flag that covered Hicks\u2019 coffin in his Knoxville congressional office. <\/p>\n An American flag that was once placed on the casket of WWII veteran Thomas R. Hicks hangs in the Knoxville, Tenn., office of Rep. Tim Burchett. Courtesy of Tim Burchett<\/p>\n But Burchett\u2019s gambit could trigger a contentious fight over who gets to serve in Congress, potentially delaying the House\u2019s work.<\/p>\n Contested elections \u201ccan muck up the legislative process and take time away from real governing,\u201d said Dr. Jeffery Jenkins, a political scientist at the University of Southern California Price School of Public Policy.<\/p>\n There have been more than 600 contested elections in the nation\u2019s history, but they haven\u2019t been \u201ctruly meaningful\u201d since the turn of the 20th century,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Burchett\u2019s uncle Thomas R. Hicks died in Normandy in World War II. Courtesy of Tim Burchett<\/p>\n \u201cThat said, the last decade or so has made me wonder if we\u2019re in a \u2018new normal\u2019 for what\u2019s possible. And that might include turning back the clock to strategies the parties used a century ago.\u201d<\/p>\n Chevalier \u2014 who will face Republican Jomo M. Williams in the general election \u2014 made the controversial comment in a 2019 Twitter post that has since been deleted: \u201cI forgot to get napkins so I just wiped my hand on the American flag behind me.\u201d <\/p>\n Chevalier, who upended Rep. Adriano Espaillat in the primary for the 13th Congressional District, which covers northern Manhattan and the western Bronx, later said she regretted the comment.<\/p>\n \u201cYou take an oath to uphold the Constitution, and and you\u2019re pretty much disavowing it right there,\u201d Burchett said. He called Chevalier\u2019s comments about the flag an affront to his late uncle Thomas R. Hicks. Courtesy of Tim Burchett<\/p>\n It was just one flashpoint in the Mamdani-backed socialist\u2019s history of controversy.<\/p>\n