Mitt Romney’s aides were annoyed this week after his fellow senator from Utah, Mike Lee, pleaded with Romney to “get on board” and support his reelection bid during a cable news interview, according to two people in contact with his staff.
Their complicated dynamic has become a focal point in the final weeks of Lee’s reelection bid, a more competitive race than many anticipated.
McMullin “talks nonstop about Romney,” said Kirk Jowers, a former legal adviser to Romney who is backing Lee. “Which has put an 800-pound gorilla in the room that is frustrating to both the Lee and Romney camps.” McMullin said in an interview that he appreciates Romney’s neutrality and said, “I would approach the job of Senator much in the same way he does.”
One person close to Romney said his neutrality in the race “could have been a nonissue” and said those close to Romney were confused by Lee’s comment in the Fox interview. “The notion that Mitt Romney can somehow win or lose this race for him is just absurd,” the person said.Lee is favored to win in a state that Trump carried by 20 points two years ago.
One woman yelled at Smith to sit down. Some people tried to block the sign by standing in front of it. “You’re going to put Evan McMullin in office!” someone in an “I LIKE MIKE” shirt said in disgust later as Smith told fellow rallygoers it was useless to vote. But Lee came to embrace Trump, like many others in his party, even comparing Trump to the Book of Mormon leader Captain Moroni at a rally in 2020 — comments that drew a backlash from some fellow Mormons. The words now feature in anti-Lee billboards and an ad released this week by McMullin’s campaign. Defending his comparison back in 2020, Lee acknowledged that some people were offended but said Trump had “far exceeded” his expectations.
Still, the text messages weighed on voters like James Harrison, who showed up to a small backyard gathering with McMullin in the suburbs around Salt Lake City. “His whole shtick is kind of like he’s a principled constitutionalist,” said Harrison, 34, a Republican who voted for Trump in 2020 and quickly regretted it. “And then he went entirely against that.”
Lee and his supporters denounce McMullin as a Democrat in disguise, and some Republicans who shared his distaste for Trump were still distrustful of McMullin or worried that he could help Democrats gain the edge in a narrowly divided chamber. At his event in southern Utah last week, Lee emphasized that his opponent endorsed Biden in 2020 and claimed he has nothing but criticism for Republicans.