The 72-year-old senator is unusually well positioned to take on a president who remains broadly popular with Republican voters. His job security is all but guaranteed in conservative Utah, where he’s a near celebrity. Many voters, particularly fellow members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, shared Romney’s wariness about Trump.

A nationwide Associated Press survey of midterm voters last year found that while two-thirds of church members voted Republican, just over half approved of Trump’s job performance. The VoteCast survey also found that 64% of Utah voters wanted to see the senator confront the president…

“I think Mitt Romney came back to the Senate for a reason, and I hope this is the reason,” said Sarah Longwell, the group’s executive director. As a former presidential nominee who built his career in part on this capacity for moral leadership, Romney has a role as a Republican elder statesman that few can match, she said. “This is going to be the moment where Mitt Romney will play, I think, the decisive role in what Republicans do going forward…

As the number of Trump critics dwindles, his public comments are significant and could create some space to for others to voice concern, said Evan McMullin, a former CIA agent who ran against Trump as a third-party candidate in 2016.