Nebraska bolsters public official security as threats on the rise across the country

The Nebraska Legislature bolstered security for public officials this session by passing laws that create security checkpoints at the entrances to the capitol building in Lincoln and allow elected officials to use campaign funds on personal security.

Gina Ligon, director of the National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology and Education Center, or NCITE, based in Omaha, said this is a timely move.

“I think that this is long overdue that officials can use some of their campaign funds to protect themselves and protect their family members,” Ligon said.

The first bill, LB1237, calls for metal detectors at the entrances to the capitol building and directs Nebraska State Patrol officers to stop anyone without a permit from bringing a gun into the Capitol. The second, LB986, allows senators to use campaign funds for security personnel as well as the installation, maintenance and monitoring of security services and systems, including hardware, software and electronic equipment. Its sponsor, Sen. Eliot Bostar, said he did not want to allocate taxpayer dollars for private security, so allowing campaign funds from private donors to go to security gets around that.

“It’s not a free pass to spend money on whatever you want,” Bostar said. “These funds would still have the same transparency and oversight requirements that everything else we use campaign funds for currently has.”

Bostar said Nebraska joins many states in beefing up security at the capitol and for individual lawmakers and their families.

Ligon, with NCITE, said that threats against public officials in all political parties across the country are trending up. According to NCITE, 133 new federal charges over threats to officials were filed in 2025, up from 108 new cases in 2024. This increasing trend is on pace to continue in 2026.

Ligon said these numbers represent only the most egregious federal cases. Of the new cases filed from 2024 to 2025, two were filed in Nebraska. In 2024, Samuel Edwards threatened a federal probation officer and a federal public defender during a phone call. In 2025, Chloe Johnson left threatening voicemail messages at the office of a U.S. representative. But Ligon said many threats go unreported. They are usually specific and come from someone with the means to carry them out. She added that this impacts local and federal officials across political parties, including their families. NCITE also reports that it has a chilling effect on those who might want to run for a political office.

“We actually see it as an act of terrorism in and of itself, that people are even just threatening violence against these individuals, but (also) the fact that so many of them are being acted out,” Ligon said.

This comes after Democratic Minnesota lawmaker Melissa Hortman and her husband were killed in their home last year.

Ligon said NCITE has been tracking threats to elected officials for 13 years, with its first investigation going into a threat against a local school board member. An increasing number of threats appear to coincide with intensifying political rhetoric against opposing politicians, which Ligon said comes from all levels of government all the way up to the office of the president.

“It’s not a one-party issue,” Ligon said.