Election gambit blows up on Hawley and Cruz

“Everyone can see through, and look: understand they’re running for president,” said former Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), a frequent Trump critic. “[They] think they’re getting a pass and they can be popular with the base. And there’s no harm done. There was harm done.”…

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said in an interview that he lobbied Hawley, Cruz and Sens. James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Steve Daines (R-Mont.) to change their minds on objecting to Biden’s electoral votes when senators were holed up in a secure area following the attack. Lankford and Daines backed off “when they saw the danger of what happened,” Manchin said. He told Hawley to “please think of what you’re doing, please reconsider what you’re doing.”

Hours later, after rioters were finally cleared from the Capitol, Hawley still objected to Pennsylvania. And Cruz voted with Hawley against certifying the election in the Keystone State. Five other GOP senators joined them.

“There’s no way they cannot be complicit in this. That they think they can walk away and say, ‘I just exercised my right as a senator?’ Especially after we came back here and after they saw what happened,” Manchin said. “I don’t know how you can live with yourself right now knowing that people lost their lives.”