Sen. Chuck Grassley Charles (Chuck) Ernest GrassleySenate Republicans signal openness to working with Biden Senators offer disaster tax relief bill Trump spikes political football with return of Big Ten season MORE (R-Iowa) on Friday called for the Federal Communications Commission to explain why a reporter was "manhandled" by security guards at the agency's headquarters a day earlier. The Republican Grassley joins Democrats that previously raised concerns about the incident.

“The Federal Communications Commission needs to take a hard look at why this happened and make sure it doesn’t happen again," Grassley said in a statement. "As The Washington Post pointed out, it’s standard operating procedure for reporters to ask questions of public officials after meetings and news conferences. It happens all day, every day."

"There’s no good reason to put hands on a reporter who’s doing his or her job,” he added.

ADVERTISEMENT

Earlier on Friday, Sens. Tom Udall Thomas (Tom) Stewart UdallLWCF modernization: Restoring the promise OVERNIGHT ENERGY: House Democrats tee up vote on climate-focused energy bill next week | EPA reappoints controversial leader to air quality advisory committee | Coronavirus creates delay in Pentagon research for alternative to 'forever chemicals' Senate Democrats demand White House fire controversial head of public lands agency MORE (D-N.M.) and Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) wrote a letter to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, warning that the incident appeared to be part of a trend of harsh treatment of journalists by the Trump administration.

John Donnelly, a reporter for CQ Roll Call, was pinned against a wall at the FCC on Thursday after reportedly trying to ask FCC Commissioner Michael O'Rielly a question before a scheduled news conference. He was then ejected from the building.

"We apologized to Mr. Donnelly more than once and let him know that the FCC was on heightened alert today based on several threats,” an FCC spokesman told The Hill in an email Thursday.