Utah’s Republican legislators and the entire Utah congressional delegation should reflect on the example set by Greg Walker, a Republican state senator in Indiana. Walker demonstrates that it is still possible for a GOP elected official to have a spine, retain a basic sense of decency and evidence fidelity to his oath of office.
Walker, despite pressure from the White House, adamantly refuses to support partisan gerrymandering in his state.
Sen. Walker notes: “I was taught as a child the difference between right and wrong, and this [gerrymandering] is just wrong on so many levels.”
Walker believes Trump’s promotion of mid-decade redistricting has an obvious motive: “The president [is] trying to save his own skin by holding a majority in Congress … so that he’s not impeached again. That’s all this is about.”
Walker declined Trump’s Nov. 19 invitation to discuss the matter with him in the Oval Office. The Indiana senator expresses concern that the invitation violated the Hatch Act — that President Trump would be using public resources for partisan purposes.
Walker states he would have reported the likely violation if he “thought that there was anyone of integrity in Washington who would follow through on my accusation and actually cause someone to lose their job over it.”
Walker asks telling questions that other GOP politicians should be asking: “How does [Trump] have the time to mess with a nobody like me?…There is no way that he should have time to have a conversation with me about Indiana mapmaking when that’s not his business… doesn’t he have anything better to do?”
What are the chances that any of Utah’s GOP elected officials will follow Walker’s example?
Andrew Bjelland, Salt Lake City
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