Democrats sang "We Shall Overcome" on the House floor Thursday morning after the chamber voted to censure Rep. Al Green (D., Texas) for shaking his cane and heckling President Donald Trump's Tuesday congressional address.
Ten Democrats joined Republicans in a 224-198 vote to censure Green, after which multiple Democrats started singing the protest song.
The House then erupted into a shouting match, Punchbowl News's Jake Sherman reported.
Green's heckling began just minutes into Trump's address, when the president declared his electoral victory a "mandate." Even after House Speaker Mike Johnson (R., La.) warned Green multiple times, the Texas congressman kept shouting and waving his cane in protest, leading Johnson to expel Green from the chamber.
The Texas congressman, a longtime critic of Trump, has made several failed attempts to impeach the president, filing articles in December 2017, January 2018, and July 2019. Each attempt was overwhelmingly blocked by the House, with 137 Democrats joining Republicans to block Green's July 2019 proposal.
Green last month filed impeachment articles again, this time for "dastardly deeds." He told reporters following his ejection that he was still working on impeachment articles.
Trump told Fox News's Brooke Singman following the vote that Green "should be forced to pass an IQ test."
Green on Wednesday defended his heckling, saying, "I would do it again."
Republican congressman Dan Newhouse (Wash.), who was the first to formally introduce a censure resolution against Green, condemned Green's "sheer disregard" for "decorum and order" in Congress, calling the Democrat's heckling as "one of the most shameful acts that I've ever seen on this floor."
Green "has made history in a terrible way," Johnson told reporters. "If they want to make a 77-year-old heckling congressman the face of their resistance, if that's the Democrat Party, so be it. But we will not tolerate it on the House floor."