Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) directly criticized President Trump on Thursday night for efforts by the president and his allies to reverse the results of the presidential election.
Romney, in a statement that marks the strongest pushback by a Senate Republican, said the president had “failed to make even a plausible case of widespread fraud or conspiracy” in a myriad of challenges the president’s legal team launched in several battleground states where he trailed President-elect Joe Biden.
“The president has now resorted to overt pressure on state and local officials to subvert the will of the people and overturn the election. It is difficult to imagine a worse, more undemocratic action by a sitting American president,” Romney said in a statement posted to Twitter.
Romney’s statement comes after Trump invited some of Michigan’s top Republicans to the White House in a sign he may be seeking a way around the election results where Biden is projected to get 306 electoral votes to Trump’s 232.
Two other GOP senators – Sens. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) and Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) – have pushed back against comments made during Giuliani’s press conference on Thursday.
Sasse, a potential 2024 contender, warned that the “wild press conferences erode public trust,” adding that “we are a nation of laws, not tweets.”
Ernst, meanwhile, rebuked claims made by Sidney Powell, a lawyer associated with the campaign, who said that down-ballot candidates could have “paid to have the system rigged to work for them,” with the GOP senator calling the statement “offensive” and “absolutely outrageous.”