Previous GOP congressman leaves get together, states it has ‘become a cult’

• Former Rep. Mickey Edwards of Oklahoma, recognized as a stalwart conservative throughout his times on Capitol Hill, stated on Thursday that he is leaving the Republican Celebration since it has develop into a “cult” less than President Donald Trump.
• In an interview with KFOR-Tv, the Oklahoma Town-based mostly NBC affiliate, Edwards decried Republicans who backed Trump’s monthslong work to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s election get, even immediately after the fatal Capitol riots that claimed 5 lives.
• “This has turn into a cult,” he mentioned. “It is really no longer a political celebration. It can be a cult. It’s the variety of a cult that when the leader of the cult does everything, no make a difference what it is, or how awful it is, they voted,” he mentioned.
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Previous Rep. Mickey Edwards of Oklahoma, recognised as a stalwart conservative during his days on Capitol Hill, said on Thursday that he is leaving the Republican Celebration because it has “turn into a cult” below President Donald Trump.

In an interview with KFOR-Television, the Oklahoma Town-based mostly NBC affiliate, and in a private essay on The Bulwark, Edwards lamented the existing route of the GOP, criticizing Republicans who sought to overturn the 2020 presidential election final results and even following the deadly Capitol riots on Jan. 6.

“There is no Republican Occasion any longer that has values, principles, morals, anything at all,” he informed KFOR-Television set. “We imagined taxes could be way too large and hazardous, we considered regulation could be also considerably and unsafe, we should really have a potent military services – I agreed with all of that. I however concur with that.”

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A longtime critic of Trump, Edwards, who served in Congress from 1977 to 1993 and chaired the Household Republican Plan Committee, cowrote a letter with former GOP Rep. Charles Djou of Hawaii previous calendar year that blasted the president as “an sick-fashioned gentleman who lacks standard self-command.” In the letter, Edwards and Djou also backed President-elect Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign.

Because his November election decline, Trump has constantly questioned the legitimacy of the election and his allies sought to invalidate mail-in votes in crucial swing states. For months, the president’s legal staff unleashed a myriad of lawsuits throughout the state trying to get to overturn the election, which went nowhere.

In the KFOR-Television job interview, Edwards decried Trump’s affect in excess of GOP members of the Oklahoma congressional delegation who continued to contest Biden’s election following the harrowing riots.

“This has turn into a cult,” he stated. “It truly is no extended a political bash. It is a cult. It is really the form of a cult that when the leader of the cult does anything, no subject what it is, or how awful it is, they voted,” Edwards said.

He included: “They voted to query the election outcomes even just after persons came into the Capitol, tried to kill them and killed a police officer who was striving to secure them.”

Edwards has registered as an unbiased but hopes that the GOP will reorient itself likely ahead, particularly contacting out the GOP senators who initially led in the effort and hard work to overturn the election results.

“You’ve bought the Josh Hawleys, and the Ted Cruzes and the James Lankfords, and these persons who are allowing their personalized ambition, and dread of the voters, they want to inherit those voters, and it is really major them to genuine darkish paths,” he mentioned. “I do not know what the potential is, but for me it is exterior of the Republican Social gathering.”