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The Margin: People are obsessed with ‘woman in blue’ on the staircase above the House Republican SCIF protest

The mystery woman is confirmed to be Charli Huddleston, spokeswoman for Rep. Jim Jordan. Read More...

Who is the woman in blue?

As images of about two dozen House Republicans staging a news conference and then storming a closed-door impeachment-inquiry deposition began hitting social media Wednesday, one shot in particular caught the Twitterverse’s attention: a woman in a blue dress — perfectly framed in a patch of golden light — standing on the staircase above the sea of mostly male lawmakers.

The mystery woman is in fact Charli Huddleston, 25, the spokeswoman for Rep. Jim Jordan, the Ohio Republican. She told MarketWatch that the original picture posted by Daily Beast reporter Sam Brodey caught her while she was looking for her boss, as House Minority Whip Steve Scalise had summoned him.

“Yes, that is me,” she said, laughing. “You know, on top of all the press conferences, and making sure Mr. Jordan gets to the floor, and going viral on the internet, it’s just a regular day.

“I don’t want the attention,” she added, “but at least I looked OK.”

That image has been retweeted more than 1,400 times, with many readers claiming to identify with Huddleston, who appears to be staring up into space as if she has lost patience with the political chaos below her.

“The woman in blue: ‘Lord, beer me strength,’ ” joked Buzzfeed News D.C. editor Sarah Mimms.

“She is all of us,” added a Twitter TWTR, +0.05% user under the name Jessica Johnson.

Many users mused that she appeared to be ascending to an otherworldly plane.

But, in fact, her boss was a part of the political demonstration, which Huddleston would not describe to MarketWatch as a protest, nor did she agree with the assessment that barging into a secured space qualified as chaos. “It was not chaotic; it was organized,” she said. “But what occurred at SCIF is not about me. I’m just a nobody; a Congressional staffer.”

Read more: Republicans barge into SCIF and sideline deposition of Pentagon’s Laura Cooper

Huddleston discovered she was becoming a somebody online after a friend DM’d her Brodey’s viral post. “Sam Brodey just has a way with the camera, I guess, and he made me look good,” she said.

The little blue dress is something she paid $30 for at Nordstrom Rack, she reported. “It was the one that was clean,” she said of why she was wearing it Wednesday. “I’m just glad I brushed my hair this morning … used some dry shampoo, parted it on the side. It’s been so crazy.”

But she made the image her banner photo on her Twitter profile because her friends were hounding her to do so. “They think it’s hilarious,” she said. “But I don’t want to be a viral meme on the internet. I hope this all goes away soon.”

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