Emergency dispatchers received a call from a passerby who saw a fire coming from an office building on Sunday morning, Madison Police Communications Supervisor Keith Johnson told CNN. Firefighters from the Madison Fire Department were called to the building around 6 a.m. and were able to quickly extinguish the blaze, officials said. No injuries were reported.
“Our department has and continues to help people speak freely and openly about their beliefs. But we believe that any act of violence, including the destruction of property, does not help any cause,” Barnes said. “We have notified our federal partners of this incident and are working with them and the Madison Fire Department as we investigate this arson.”
WFA president responds to vandalism
WFA President Juliane Appling told CNN she was attending a Mother’s Day brunch at her church around 7:45 a.m. Sunday when she received a call from management at her office building, which said the WFA office had been broken into.
Appling said she was told that a few of what she describes as Molotov cocktails were thrown through several windows in the space, which started a small fire.
Graffiti was found spray-painted outside the building, where WFA rents space, she said.
“The irony of what happens on Mother’s Day is very poignant,” Appling said.
The WFA has not received any indication of a specific threat leading up to Sunday morning’s incident, it said.
“I pray this doesn’t happen to anyone else, it has to stop now,” Appling said.
The Supreme Court’s draft opinion leaked last week
The opinion would be the most consequential abortion ruling in decades and would transform the landscape of women’s reproductive health in America. The final opinion in the case – Dobbs v. Jackson, which involves a challenge to Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban — is not expected to be released until late June.
Late Wednesday evening, security crews began installing an 8-foot-tall non-scalable fence around parts of the Supreme Court building, and Thursday evening, crews installed concrete barriers blocking the street outside the court. .
CNN’s Natalie Andes contributed to this report.
