'Jan. 6 wasn't a fantasy': Top Missouri paper says it's 'long past time' for senate to investigate Josh Hawley

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29 November 2021

'Fundamentally wrong': Josh Hawley’s hometown paper slams region's GOP senators for voting to acquit Trump

On Sunday, the editorial board of the St Louis Post-Dispatch called on the U.S. Senate Ethics Panel to investigate Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) over any possible involvement he may have had in the Jan 6th insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Hawley, whose political future will be haunted by a photo of him giving a raised fist to insurrectionists as they stormed the halls of Congress has been excoriated by the paper's editors multiple times, but Sunday's call for an investigation ramps up their attacks on the home state senator.

According to the board, "Ten months after a group of Senate Democrats lodged ethics complaints into the conduct of Republican Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Ted Cruz of Texas regarding their roles in sparking the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, the Senate Ethics Committee has shown no sign of movement.," with the editors saying it is "long past time" to take a hard look at both Republican senators.

"Jan. 6 wasn't a fantasy; it was real, and the culpability of these two senators must be determined," they wrote. "Hawley and Cruz were the only two senators to object to certification of Joe Biden's clear victory in the 2020 election results, citing (with zero evidence) supposed concerns about the election's integrity. That was the same baseless, toxic nonsense then-President Donald Trump had been spewing since before the election. Such talk whipped up the mob of Trump loyalists to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6."

Adding, "Even after the violence, he persisted in voting with just five other senators to continue promoting Trump's big lie that Biden's win was illegitimate," the editors wrote, "If he had an ounce of honor, he'd have heeded our Jan. 7 call for his resignation (we certainly weren't alone on that). But at this point, why even talk about honor?"

Writing that, "Just because there's a mechanism in place allowing senators to object to election results doesn't mean it's OK for Hawley to abuse that process for crass political gain," the editorial concluded, "Hawley and Cruz have the right to defend themselves from the allegations — but so far, they haven't even had to. The Ethics Committee should stop sitting on this."

You can read the whole piece here.

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