Josh Hawley: GOP senator eviscerated by home state’s largest newspaper

Paper calls on the Senator to stop using his constituents as scapegoats for his actions

Voices from Senator Josh Hawley's home state ripped into him for his continued fealty to Donald Trump.

The editorial board of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the state's largest newspaper, blasted Senators Hawley and Roy Blunt for "blindly supporting" the former president.

The authors said Mr Hawley and Mr Blunt were "refusing to see Trump's guilt".

Mr Hawley and Sen. Ted Cruz led the Republican challenge to the electoral vote count on 6 January that preceded the Capitol insurrection.

During the trial, Mr Hawley was spotted sitting in the gallery, ignoring the proceedings and doing paperwork.

The paper accused Mr Hawley of working for the benefit of tyranny.

“The Senate impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump should be an opportunity for Missouri Sens. Roy Blunt and Josh Hawley to redeem themselves for blindly supporting a man whose conduct was indefensible,” the Post-Dispatch editorial board wrote. “Instead, they continue bringing additional embarrassment to the state after having flirted with the abolition of democracy in favour of keeping a dictator wannabe in the White House.”

The editorial pointed out that Mr Blunt further humiliated his home state when he admitted he had not spent time watching the footage of the Capitol attack until the prosecution's arguments during the trial.

The authors then turn their attention back to Mr Hawley, who has dismissed the impeachment trial as "unconstitutional" despite the Senate ruling that the trial was constitutional.

Many Republican lawmakers have tried to hide behind this argument. By arguing that the entire process is not legal, it frees Republicans from having to choose between supporting Mr Trump's behaviour and punishing him, which would likely make them targets of the Trump-supporting mob.

According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board, Mr Hawley's office has been shrugging off his constituents' angry letters and replying with form mail, despite using their alleged concerns to justify his challenge to the 2020 election.

The paper pointed out that more than 40 per cent of Mr Hawley's constituency voted against Mr Trump. The authors argued that he should pay attention to their concerns as well, rather than using them as a scapegoat for his actions in Washington, citing a statement the senator gave in which he promised he "will not bow to a lawless mob, or allow criminals to drown out the legitimate concerns of my constituents".

"Technically, Hawley is correct. He didn’t bow to the lawless mob; he fist-pumped his solidarity with them," the editorial read.