Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) was asked about presidential virtue and Trump’s behavior. Instead of condemning the President, Trump’s answer showed why Republicans are going to sink because enable and refuse to stand up to him.
Video of Lee on CBS’s Face The Nation:
https://youtu.be/vsKbS0LLJlo
Transcript via CBS’s Face The Nation:
DICKERSON: Let me ask you another — as somebody who has been thinking about the founders and their standards and keeping them freshly in mind, the founders talked a lot about the virtue of their president.
To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.
Evaluate, based on your view of the standards the founders set for virtue, the current behavior of the president this week.
LEE: Look, the president of the United States is a unique man.
He campaigned on a very aggressive platform that involved draining the swamp. The president takes a unique approach, one that differs from many of his predecessors.
It’s not going to do any good for me or anyone else to come in and just comment on things we might not like about his Twitter behavior. The best thing we can do when we want to elevate civil dialogue in our American political discourse is to do whatever we can to make sure that we treat others kindly, with dignity and respect.
And that’s what I intend to do.
Trump is never going to change, and his behavior will never get better if Republicans continue to enable him by refusing to stand up to him. The lack of willingness to confront the President’s behavior has nothing to do with Trump himself. Elected Republicans don’t fear Trump. They found out very quickly that he is a paper tiger with no bite behind his bark.
Elected Republicans like Sen. Lee fear the same thing that they have always feared. They are terrified of angering Trump supporters. They are afraid of getting primaried. They are afraid of Trump’s 85% approval rating within the party.
People like Mike Lee are cowards who won’t condemn the President’s behavior, because of this, as Trump crashes and burns, he is taking the entire Republican Party down with him.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
