A Democratic state lawmaker in New Hampshire, caught twice for alleged high-speed driving in the span of six months, is arguing that police had no right to pull her over, because the state constitution shields legislators traveling to or from session.
State Rep. Ellen Read was stopped on Interstate 93 in Windham in December 2024 for allegedly driving more than 100 mph. Six months later, in June 2025, she was stopped again in Londonderry, this time for an alleged 92 mph in a 65 mph zone. Both times, Read told the officers she was returning from the General Court. Both times, she invoked a provision of the New Hampshire Constitution ratified in 1784.
The provision reads: "No member of the House of Representatives, or Senate shall be arrested, or held to bail, on mesne process, during his going to, returning from, or attendance upon, the Court." Read's legal argument, as Fox News Digital reported, is that this language bars law enforcement from so much as stopping a sitting legislator during her commute, regardless of how fast she was driving.
A judge disagreed. In August 2025, Read was found guilty of negligent driving in the first case and fined $1,240, with half the fine deferred. She was allowed to keep her license on conditions: two years of good behavior, completion of a safe-driving course, and no additional moving violations.
Read's filing stated that she "was a sitting member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives" at the time of the stop, that she "was traveling in a vehicle bearing a New Hampshire State Representative license plate," and that she "informed the deputy that she was returning from the General Court."
Her legal conclusion followed directly:
"Under the plain language of the New Hampshire Constitution, defendant was unlawfully detained/seized/arrested in violation of her Legislative privilege. All evidence illegally obtained should be suppressed, and the charge dismissed."
Read's petition also argued that the New Hampshire Supreme Court has never squarely addressed this constitutional question in approximately 240 years since the provision was ratified, making it, in her view, a matter of first impression.
The Supreme Court was unpersuaded, at least for now. It declined to take up the constitutional question before the second speeding case proceeded, denying Read's petition without prejudice. That means she can raise the arguments again in a future appeal, if she follows court rules.
Read and her office mounted a separate factual defense through an Instagram statement. They disputed the allegation that she exceeded 100 mph, claiming the vehicle she was driving, a 2009 Toyota Yaris with more than 440,000 miles on the odometer, "simply cannot go that fast."
Her office also stated that the officer did not use radar or clock her speed, instead estimating it while accelerating to catch up to her vehicle. Read's team criticized the lack of body-camera footage from the stop. And they pointed to a State House employee who was reportedly on the phone with Read during the traffic stop and later testified to an account that conflicted with the officer's version of events.
Read told Fox News Digital she accepted the reduced negligent driving charge "to end the case" and did not appeal the constitutional issue in the first matter.
In her telling, the constitutional argument was never about dodging accountability for speeding. It was about the legality of the stop itself.
"The plain reading of the Constitution says that legislators cannot be stopped on their way to or from their duties. It says nothing of being ticketed or arrested at the end of the commute, and nothing about prosecution."
She added:
"It was always the commute itself that was meant to be protected... Not the legislator protected from breaking the law."
Read wants to draw a clean line between the stop and the charge. She insists the constitutional provision protects the commute, the physical act of traveling, not the lawmaker from legal consequences. In her framing, police should have let her pass and then ticketed or prosecuted her later.
"The unconstitutional manner of the stops, and not the charge, therefore, was the topic of discussion in the case."
Her own petition acknowledged the obvious counterpoint, stating: "The question is not whether a sitting legislator is 'above the law.'" But that is precisely the question most New Hampshire residents would ask, and a judge already answered it.
The 1784 provision was written for a different era and a different problem. Its purpose, as Read herself acknowledged, was to prevent local officials from delaying lawmakers and interfering with legislative votes. It was a safeguard against political obstruction, not a free pass for reckless driving on a modern interstate.
Read's reading of the text would create an absurd result: any sitting legislator heading to or from Concord could drive at any speed, blow through any red light, and wave off any officer who tried to intervene, so long as the State Representative plate was visible and the magic words were spoken. The officer would be constitutionally obligated to watch a vehicle allegedly traveling at triple-digit speeds disappear down I-93 and hope to sort it out later.
What makes this case harder to dismiss as a one-off misunderstanding is the second stop. In June 2025, months after the first incident, Read was again pulled over, this time in Londonderry, for allegedly driving 92 mph in a 65 mph zone. And again, she told officers she was returning from a legislative session.
The second case remains unresolved. The Supreme Court's refusal to intervene before trial means the constitutional argument will not serve as a pre-trial shield. Read may raise it on appeal, but she will have to go through the normal process first, the same process that applies to every other driver in New Hampshire.
The fine in the first case, $1,240, half deferred, was modest by any standard. The conditions attached to her license were lenient. A two-year good-behavior window, a safe-driving course, and a requirement to avoid moving violations hardly amount to a harsh penalty for someone accused of driving more than 100 mph.
Read was stopped twice in six months for alleged high-speed driving. She invoked her office both times. She filed legal motions arguing that the stops themselves were unconstitutional. A trial court rejected that argument. The state Supreme Court declined to fast-track it. She was convicted of negligent driving. And the second case is still pending.
Her factual defenses, the old car, the lack of radar, the missing body-camera footage, may or may not hold weight in the second proceeding. Those are legitimate evidentiary questions for a courtroom. But the constitutional claim is something else entirely. It is an elected official arguing that the badge she wears, or more precisely, the plate on her car, entitles her to a different set of rules on the highway.
The 1784 provision exists in a handful of state constitutions in one form or another. Its original purpose was narrow and practical: keep the legislature functioning by preventing politically motivated arrests of lawmakers en route to session. Nobody who ratified it imagined a state representative doing triple digits on an interstate and telling the deputy she was constitutionally untouchable.
Read insists she is not claiming to be above the law. But when a lawmaker tells police they cannot stop her, twice, and then files motions demanding dismissal on the grounds that the stops violated her legislative privilege, the distinction between "above the law" and "immune from enforcement" becomes invisible to the people who have to share the road with her.
Every other driver on I-93 that December night was subject to the same speed limits and the same consequences. Read believes she was not. A judge said otherwise. The New Hampshire Supreme Court, for now, has declined to say she was right.
If the Constitution means what Read says it means, then every lawmaker in New Hampshire has a get-out-of-a-traffic-stop-free card for half the year. That is not a principle worth defending. It is a privilege worth ending.
