By Jennifer Rubin
Columnist |
Today at 7:45 a.m. EDT
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3 min
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has yet to explain his post-election texts with then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows that CNN revealed last week. Those texts contradict his public statements that he was surprised in early January when told of Trump lawyer John Eastman’s plot to undermine the election; instead, they detail his intense effort to compel state legislatures to provide “something” that would contravene the will of the voters.
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Rather than explain his conduct, Lee is hiding from the media. His home-state paper, the Salt Lake Tribune, reports, “Sen. Mike Lee refused to answer questions on Tuesday about recently published text messages that offer detail on his role at the center of a plot to overturn former president Donald Trump’s election loss.”
If Lee had acted ethically and in accordance with his oath, he should have no compunction about taking questions. Instead, the Tribune reports, “Approached by a Salt Lake Tribune reporter at the Summit County Republican Party Convention in Kamas, Lee staffers blocked access to the senator.” (Lee’s behavior is unacceptable, but so is that of aides, who are employed and paid by taxpayers. They are not Lee’s private security force.)
This raises an interesting question for Lee: Does he plan on hiding until Election Day? Will he decline all debates where this might come up?
Evan McMullin, the Utah conservative running as an independent to replace Lee in the Senate, has not minced words. He tells me, “Senator Lee, a self-described constitutional conservative, committed an unpardonable betrayal of his oath and the public trust by conspiring with others to overthrow the republic to keep a defeated president in office against the will of the people." McMullin adds, “Whether Lee accepts it or not, we are still a democracy and he is still accountable to us. … He owes Utahns and the entire country a full, honest accounting of his role in this brazen treachery. He has no place in the U.S. Senate, and I’m asking Utahns of all party affiliations to hold him accountable.”
At the root of Lee’s betrayal was his determination to enlist state legislatures absent evidence of fraud to throw sand in the wheels of the electoral college process or overrule the choice of voters. The Trumpian mentality that rules can be twisted to serve the Great Leader seems to have metastasized throughout the GOP.
One portion of the Lee-Meadows discussion illustrates this mind-set. As Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias writes for Democracy Docket, Lee in his texts to Meadows at one point asked how many ballots in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin were “tossed” under state law. “The issue Lee refers to in his text to Meadows specifically relates to the timing of the receipt of mail-in ballots,” Elias explains. The GOP doggedly pursued lawsuits all the way to the Supreme Court to prevent ballots received after Election Day from being counted. “Only after his candidate of choice lost the election did Lee suggest that he might actually want them counted after all,” Elias writes. Does Lee think it would have been legal to defy the courts and count the ballots received late if doing so would help his side?
“Fraud,” in GOP vernacular, refers to Republicans losing elections. But they are apparently okay with changing the rules to ensure the MAGA crowd stays in power. Put differently, Elias observes, “Republicans are all for counting your votes, but only when their party is the winning team.”
Maybe that is why so many of the actual cases of alleged fraud in the 2020 election were carried out by Republicans. And maybe that is why Republicans are so intent on allowing GOP-controlled legislatures to displace neutral election officials. Republicans seem to believe that nothing — not state law, the Constitution or voters — should stand in the way of their assuming power.
Columnist |
Today at 7:45 a.m. EDT
Listen to article
3 min
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has yet to explain his post-election texts with then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows that CNN revealed last week. Those texts contradict his public statements that he was surprised in early January when told of Trump lawyer John Eastman’s plot to undermine the election; instead, they detail his intense effort to compel state legislatures to provide “something” that would contravene the will of the voters.
Sign up for a weekly roundup of thought-provoking ideas and debates
Rather than explain his conduct, Lee is hiding from the media. His home-state paper, the Salt Lake Tribune, reports, “Sen. Mike Lee refused to answer questions on Tuesday about recently published text messages that offer detail on his role at the center of a plot to overturn former president Donald Trump’s election loss.”
If Lee had acted ethically and in accordance with his oath, he should have no compunction about taking questions. Instead, the Tribune reports, “Approached by a Salt Lake Tribune reporter at the Summit County Republican Party Convention in Kamas, Lee staffers blocked access to the senator.” (Lee’s behavior is unacceptable, but so is that of aides, who are employed and paid by taxpayers. They are not Lee’s private security force.)
This raises an interesting question for Lee: Does he plan on hiding until Election Day? Will he decline all debates where this might come up?
Evan McMullin, the Utah conservative running as an independent to replace Lee in the Senate, has not minced words. He tells me, “Senator Lee, a self-described constitutional conservative, committed an unpardonable betrayal of his oath and the public trust by conspiring with others to overthrow the republic to keep a defeated president in office against the will of the people." McMullin adds, “Whether Lee accepts it or not, we are still a democracy and he is still accountable to us. … He owes Utahns and the entire country a full, honest accounting of his role in this brazen treachery. He has no place in the U.S. Senate, and I’m asking Utahns of all party affiliations to hold him accountable.”
At the root of Lee’s betrayal was his determination to enlist state legislatures absent evidence of fraud to throw sand in the wheels of the electoral college process or overrule the choice of voters. The Trumpian mentality that rules can be twisted to serve the Great Leader seems to have metastasized throughout the GOP.
One portion of the Lee-Meadows discussion illustrates this mind-set. As Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias writes for Democracy Docket, Lee in his texts to Meadows at one point asked how many ballots in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin were “tossed” under state law. “The issue Lee refers to in his text to Meadows specifically relates to the timing of the receipt of mail-in ballots,” Elias explains. The GOP doggedly pursued lawsuits all the way to the Supreme Court to prevent ballots received after Election Day from being counted. “Only after his candidate of choice lost the election did Lee suggest that he might actually want them counted after all,” Elias writes. Does Lee think it would have been legal to defy the courts and count the ballots received late if doing so would help his side?
“Fraud,” in GOP vernacular, refers to Republicans losing elections. But they are apparently okay with changing the rules to ensure the MAGA crowd stays in power. Put differently, Elias observes, “Republicans are all for counting your votes, but only when their party is the winning team.”
Maybe that is why so many of the actual cases of alleged fraud in the 2020 election were carried out by Republicans. And maybe that is why Republicans are so intent on allowing GOP-controlled legislatures to displace neutral election officials. Republicans seem to believe that nothing — not state law, the Constitution or voters — should stand in the way of their assuming power.
