'We trusted you': Evan McMullin collars GOP Senator Mike Lee over his role in Donald Trump's failed coup

18 October 2022

Independent United States Senate candidate Evan McMullin of Utah tore into incumbent Republican Senator Mike Lee during a Monday night debate for having been a willing participant in the numerous foredoomed schemes that were concocted to overturn the 2020 election in favor of former President Donald Trump.

McMullin, an ex-Central Intelligence Agency officer whose campaign is centered on non-partisanship, looked into Lee's eyes and accused him of forsaking his oath of office and doing nothing to stop the violent mob that Trump sicked on the Capitol on January 6th, 2021:

I think about the men and women who I served with in the CIA, who left the warmth of their homes and the love of their families to risk their lives, not knowing if they would ever come home in order to stop terrorists who were intent on destroying freedom in America. I think about all these men and women, the fourteen generations of Americans who have sacrificed for this grand experiment in freedom. They trusted you. We trusted you. And with that trust and with your knowledge of the Constitution, Senator Lee, you sought to find a weakness in our system. You advised the White House. Find an alternative slate of electors for Trump to overturn the will of the people. That's what you said. You said that the president should listen to legal quack Sidney Powell. Please make time for her, let her in, you told the White House chief of staff. You told the president that you were working overtime – fourteen hours a day I think you said – to 'unravel this' for him, to keep a president who had been voted out of office, according to the will of the people in power, despite the will of the people. Senator Lee, it is a betrayal of the American republic. You were there to stand up for our Constitution. But when the barbarians were at the gate, you were happy to let them in.

Lee, unrepentant, issued a blanket denial:

Okay, I think I disagree with everything my opponent just said, including the words 'but,' 'and,' and 'the.' It was an information-free, truth-free statement. That's something of a record. Look, um, there is absolutely nothing to the idea that I would have ever supported, ever did support, the fake electors plot. Nothing. There's not a scintilla of evidence suggesting that and yet you continue to insist that with a cavalier, reckless disregard for the truth.

Back in April, The Washington Post noted that text messages between Lee and then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows exchanged shortly after the 2020 election which were handed over to the House Select Committee investigating the Capitol insurrection clearly show that Lee was all-in on Trump World's multipronged plot to steal the presidency.

“We need something from state legislatures to make this legitimate and to have any hope of winning," Lee wrote to Meadows. "Even if they can’t convene, it might be enough if a majority of them are willing to sign a statement indicating how they would vote."

His enthusiasm for the coup did not end there.

"In another text to Meadows, Lee expressed frustration with [Senators] [Ted] Cruz [R-Texas] and [Josh] Hawley [R-Missouri], arguing that the two were supporting Trump’s efforts only to their benefit, and Trump’s detriment," the Post explained. "Lee said that unless the effort produced a competing slate of electors under state law, it would only hurt Trump."

Lee also told Meadows that "I only know that this will end badly for the President unless we have the Constitution on our side," adding, "and unless these states submit new slates of Trump electors pursuant to state law, we do not.”

Although Lee did eventually concede that there was no legal path for Trump to remain in power and that hiring Powell was indeed a bad idea, his communications with Meadows are black-and-white confirmation of what McMullin recalled during their debate.

Watch below or at this link.

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