Today, or perhaps it was yesterday, former President Trump withdrew his endorsement of Rep Mo Brooks (R-AL) in Brooks’ pursuit of the GOP nomination for the open Senate seat, which is opening up because of the retirement of Senator Richard Shelby (R-AL). The former President was disgruntled that Brooks no longer wished to wallow with Trump in The 2020 Election was Stolen from Me! mud-pit. Trump is confident that the people of Alabama would prefer to swelter in that particular falsehood, and I doubt Brooks will prove him wrong, as Brooks campaign is not doing well at all; in fact, nothing will be proven if Brooks fails to win the nomination.
Brooks, to his credit, returned fire, but it was really quite unsatisfying, once you stop and analyze it.
“President Trump asked me to rescind the 2020 elections, immediately remove Joe Biden from the White House, immediately put President Trump back in the White House, and hold a new special election for the presidency,” Brooks said in a statement. “As a lawyer, I’ve repeatedly advised President Trump that January 6 was the final election contest verdict and neither the U.S. Constitution nor the U.S. Code permit what President Trump asks. Period.” …
Brooks responded that when Trump asked him to help him overturn the election he knew “full well that it might cause President Trump to rescind his endorsement.”
“But I took a sworn oath to defend and protect the U.S. Constitution. I honor my oath. That is the way I am. I break my sworn oath for no man,” Brooks said. “I’m still the most conservative candidate in the race.” [The Hill]
First, I doubt that Trump would have asked a minor back-bencher like Brooks to “rescind” an election. I doubt Trump would view him as having the moxie – not the power, but the moxie – to attempt such a stunt. It feels more like a “look at me!” claim.
Second, rescind is hardly the proper word. Brooks claims he’s a lawyer, so why isn’t he using the proper word? That’s puzzling.
Third, and most important, the faux-association between honoring an oath and conservatism is an attempt to self-validate being a far-right extremist. After all, he claims he’s the most conservative, just after his verbiage concerning never breaking his oath. If you read that and allow it to pass, then the careless reader ends up with the notion that Brooks must be the most honorable candidate in the race. Why?
Because, uh, he’s the most conservative … ?
That’s not how a wise person measures honor, however, not only because it’s a proxy, but it’s not clear how the two are connected – and, meantime, we can directly measure his honor by examining his record of promises made / promises broken. Screw proxies when direct measurements are available, says I.
At this point, I can say that he gave a speech encouraging the January 6th insurrection, so I think his connection of honor to conservatism is at least a bit damaged. But that’s really all I know of Brooks, who has a TrumpScore of only 88%.
That, and his riposte really seemed to be a bit weak. Perhaps he’s still trying to hold onto MAGA voters?
