Utah Sen. Mike Lee, who spent “14 hours a day” helping Donald Trump try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, says he isn’t ready to back Trump in next year’s race.
“I haven’t endorsed any presidential candidate,” Lee told constituents at a town hall meeting in Lehi on Wednesday morning. “As a U.S. senator, I always have several colleagues running, so I don’t typically make endorsements in presidential races until well into the presidential election year in question.”
According to recent polling, Trump leads a wide field of Republican candidates in the Republican primary. The first GOP primary debate is scheduled for Wednesday evening and Trump has said he isn’t participating.
While he hasn’t endorsed Trump in the 2024 race, Lee continues to defend the twice-impeached president in public. On Wednesday, after taking a shot at President Joe Biden for the cost of living under his administration, Lee said, “Do I wish Donald Trump was still president of the United States? Absolutely.”
He added, “If (Trump) gets elected president again, good for America. America has suffered enough under Joe Biden.”
The Utah senator has also been critical of criminal prosecutions of Trump, calling the indictments partisan attacks. When an attendee asked why Lee hasn’t denounced the embattled former president, the inquiry was met with both applause and boos.
“Nothing says ‘election interference’ quite like prosecuting one’s principal political opponent,” Lee has said on X.
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Utah Sen. Mike Lee, right, joins Rick Larsen, President and CEO of the Sutherland Institute during a speaking engagement at the conservative public policy think tank on the University of Utah campus on Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2023.
Since losing reelection and leaving the White House, Trump has been met with four criminal indictments, totaling 91 felony charges. The state and federal indictments allege that Trump has mishandled classified, sought to overturn the 2020 presidential election, and paid hush money to an adult film actress.
Over the weekend, Utah Republican Party leaders passed a resolution calling the charges “political persecution. The resolution calls on Utah’s all-Republican congressional delegation to condemn the “continuous political persecution” of Trump.
FBI shooting of Provo man “warrants serious investigation”
Lee also took a question about the FBI killing of a man who threatened President Joe Biden prior to his Utah visit earlier this month.
“Thank you for raising that,” he told the woman asking the question, adding that it “warrants serious investigation.”
Craig Deleeuw Robertson had posted numerous threats on social media in the days leading up to the visit, a criminal complaint states, including a post on Aug. 7 that said, “I HEAR BIDEN IS COMING TO UTAH. DIGGING OUT MY OLD GHILLE SUIT AND CLEANING THE DUST OFF THE M24 SNIPER RIFLE. WELCOME, BUFFOON-IN-CHIEF!”
Lee said he hasn’t yet commented on the incident because he doesn’t have enough information about it and what kind of threat the man posed, but based on media reports, “it seemed highly unusual that they had to kill him.”
The FBI has said that the 75-year-old Provo man pointed a gun at agents before the fatal shooting, and records obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune indicate that Robertson confronted local police with an AR-15 in 2018.
“It’s of deep concern anytime law enforcement acts in a way that results in the taking of a human life,” Lee said. “People have got to be held accountable, and we shouldn’t expect anything less. It’s with good reason that for most of our country’s history, most law enforcement has been handled at the local level.”
“I wish we didn’t have to wait that long”
Lee pointed to immigration policies and spending as other reasons he would prefer to see Trump in office, and hopes to see more like-minded people elected to Congress.
Like the Trump administration, the Biden administration is being challenged in court for restrictions it has placed on asylum-seekers at the southern border. But Republicans have taken issue with what happens after people with asylum claims cross the border, saying authorities release too many migrants from detention centers.
Utah is among a group of Republican-led states suing, saying the practice of allowing some people seeking asylum to leave a detention center before being granted the status is illegal. Lee agrees.
“Even if I were to indulge the fiction that (Biden) is on solid legal footing here, he still has an obligation to not interpret the law in a way that results in the law being completely ignored,” Lee said. “And that’s why ultimately, we have to rely on elections then to make this happen. I wish we didn’t have to wait that long.”
As he did the previous day during a forum hosted at the University of Utah by the Sutherland Institute, Lee criticized congressional leaders. The senator said their habit of waiting until “Armageddon is being foretold” to negotiate in secret on big spending bills is a problem, and that most members of Congress toeing the line and signing off on the bills results in the country spending more than it needs to.
“Most of them vote for it and then beat their chests, saying, ‘I did this for the troops.’ Alright, great,” Lee said. “These people need to lose elections if we’re ever going to get that under control.”
One person who attended the town hall asked Lee’s thoughts on state legislation that limits how teachers can approach LGTBQ issues in the classroom. Legislative proposals on what can be taught in schools have been considered elsewhere in the country, and are expected to come up in Utah.
“Could you explain to me why it is deemed inappropriate to teach gay children, trans children and otherwise queer children that nothing is wrong with them?” the attendee asked.
Lee refused to answer the question, saying the federal government “has no appropriate role in primary and secondary education,” but said the bills have likely moved forward because parents are concerned that schools pay an inappropriate amount of attention to “sexual issues.”
“The issues that you brought up, I think most people wouldn’t find offensive, but I think those statutes usually deal with something broader than what you described,” Lee said. “But again, not a state lawmaker, take it up with your state lawmakers.”
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