“The truth is I’m not a liberal or a conservative. I’m an institutionalist,” he continued. “I believe in this place and in my love of country, I yield to no one.”

Williams went on to say that the “darkness on the edge of town” had spread across communities, now making its presence felt “at the local bar and the bowling alley, at the school board and the grocery store, and it must be acknowledged and answered for.”

“Grown men and women who swore an oath to our Constitution, elected by their constituents, possessing the kinds of college degrees I could only dream of have decided to join the mob and become something they are not while hoping we somehow forget who they were,” Williams said. He did not, however, call out any individual lawmakers.

“They’ve decided to burn it all down with us inside,” he continued.