Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley are “accomplices to the big lie” and “have a lot to do” in their attempts to overturn the presidential election in favor of Donald Trump, said a Republican colleague in the Senate on Sunday amid growing calls from two men must resign or be censored.
Republican objections to the polling station’s results have failed. But Cruz and Hawley were prominent among 147 deputies and senators who supported the dawn effort on Wednesday, even after a crowd incited by the president attacked the U.S. Capitol.
Five people, including a police officer, died in the chaos, in which lawmakers were apparently the target of planned kidnappings.
The riot sparked calls for Trump to step down, while House Democrats prepared impeachment articles. Speaking to NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania became the second Republican senator to say that the president committed impeachable crimes and should “resign and leave as soon as possible.”
Toomey did not ask Cruz and Hawley to give up, although he said that they “would have a lot to do and the problem is that they were complicit in the big lie, that lie that Donald Trump won the election with an overwhelming victory and it was all stolen.
“They combined this with the notion that somehow it could all be reversed in the final moments of Congressional proceedings. So this, this is going to be, this is going to haunt you for a long time. “
On CNN’s State of the Union, he added: “They are going to pay a high price for this. I think your reputations have been affected. You have seen the type of reaction in the media in your home states, so your constituents will decide the final way to judge this. “
The Democrats huddled together. On Saturday, Sherrod Brown, a Democratic senator from Ohio, called for “Cruz and Hawley’s immediate resignations said they “betrayed their government oaths and incited a violent uprising against our democracy.”
“If they don’t resign,” he added, “the Senate must expel them.”
Patty Murray of Washington, Chris Coons of Delaware and Tina Smith of Minnesota were among other Democrats who called for Cruz and Hawley to leave.
On Sunday, Joe Manchin of West Virginia told CNN: “Whether they should resign or not, I don’t know [but] how can they live with themselves knowing that people have died because of their words and actions? “
Missouri’s Hawley was the first senator to say he would object to the election results. He has condemned the violence on the Capitol, but it was also portrayed by raising a fist towards Trump supporters. He defended his actions and condemned the decision of its editor, Simon and Schuster, to cancel a book to be released.
Hawley also objected to Joe Biden’s criticisms that Toomey echoed on Sunday. The president-elect invoked Hitler’s propaganda minister, saying that senators were “part of the big lie … Goebbels and the big lie. You keep repeating the lie, repeating the lie. “
Cruz, from Texas, also condemned the violence and opposed Biden’s comparison. He declined resignations, including from the Houston Chronicle, saying he has no regrets.
“What I was working to do is find a way to restore widespread confidence in the system,” he told his hometown newspaper.
Other Republicans gave up on their planned objections after the Capitol violence. Manchin told CNN that he admired those who put “the constitution above their own political preferences and their own political ambitions”.
On Sunday, Guardian columnist and former US Labor Secretary Robert Reich wrote that Cruz and Hawley “should be forced to resign.”
“Knowing that Trump’s allegations of electoral fraud were false,” he wrote, the two Republicans “led the movement to exclude Biden voters – even after the Capitol invasion – lending credibility to Trump’s claims.
“The United States constitution says’ no person will be a senator or representative in Congress’ who ‘has been involved in an insurrection or rebellion against’ the constitution ‘, or has given help or comfort to his enemies.”
“Both Cruz and Hawley are planning to run for president in 2024. They should be prevented from running.”