In a newspaper interview in
February 1974, Ezra Taft Benson, president of the Quorum of the Twelve
Apostles, raised the question of whether a “good Mormon” could be a “liberal
Democrat.” This assumed answer to this question has since been accepted as
gospel truth by many Latter-day Saints. But today the shoe should be on the
other foot. It is not only relevant but imperative to ask whether a believing
Latter-day Saint can in good conscience be a Republican. This is the first in a
series of at least 15 posts addressing this question from various angles. Today
I’ll be looking at what it means to support the party of Trump
The Party of Trump
Some good Latter-day Saints have
convinced themselves that even though Trump is the unquestioned leader of the
GOP, it is possible to put up with him and vote for Republicans because of
their conservative positions on issues. But the primary elections of this week
should put to rest this delusion. Trump-endorsed (and Trump-endorsing)
candidates fared very well. The most extreme example comes from sparsely populated
Wyoming. Two years ago, Liz Cheney won her congressional primary with 73
percent of the vote. This week, she lost by a margin of nearly 40 points. This
is a conservative who voted with Trump 93 percent of the time. She voted
against his impeachment for withholding aid from Ukraine. The only difference
between Cheney of 2020 and Cheney of 2022 is that she refused to go along with
the Big Lie, that because of election fraud the Democrats “stole” the election
from Trump. The Republican Party is steadily purging elected officials who
refuse to embrace his election lies.
The is just further proof that the
Republican Party has become a personality cult. In 2020, the GOP did not even
produce a platform. The de facto platform was simply to support Donald Trump’s
every whim—and
every lie. And that is a frightening thought, because Trump is a narcissist
with authoritarian instincts and a disdain for the law. Throughout his life—in his marriages, in his
business dealings, and in politics—he
has never believed that rules or laws applied to him. He cheated on three
wives; his unethical business practices are myriad; and as president, he
presided over a daily parade of scandals that was as exhausting as it was
alarming. Because of Republican leaders’ spineless surrender to this corrupt
man, the Republican Party has devolved from an anti-Democratic party to an
anti-democratic party.
Some Republican leaders have
rationalized their support of Trump by saying (or at least thinking) that if
they don’t stay in office, then someone worse will replace them. That may
happen, but the only way to reform the Republican Party is not to stay on board
and keep it afloat while it does as much damage as possible. The only way to
save the Republican Party is for both leaders and voters to officially leave it
and refuse to vote for Republican candidates, resulting in massive defeats at
the polls. This is the only way to get rid of Trump and Trumpism. Then, when he
is gone, true conservatives will have a gargantuan task of rebuilding a
political party from scratch on true conservative principles, such as they are
(which I’ll discuss in future posts).
I probably do not agree with Liz
Cheney on any traditional political issues. But I agree with her completely
about the danger our country faces right now. Donald Trump represents the
greatest danger this country has faced since the Civil War. I also agree with
the conservative Washington Examiner: “Trump is unfit to be anywhere near power
ever again.”
Latter-day Saint scripture gives
good advice on what sort of political leaders they should support. Doctrine and
Covenants 98:10 says: “Wherefore, honest men and wise men should be sought for
diligently, and good men and wise men ye should observe to uphold.” Honest,
wise, and good are not adjectives that describe Donald Trump. He corrupts
everything and everyone he touches. Consider all the prominent Republicans,
including Mike Lee, who warned in 2016 about what sort of man Donald Trump is
and how disastrous it would be to elect him president. But most of them changed
their tune when Republican power suddenly became tied to supporting this odious
man. Mike Lee even converted so far as to make the ludicrous comparison of
Trump to Book of Mormon hero Captain Moroni. Trump actually resembles Moroni’s
nemesis, Amalickiah, far more closely. Amalickiah, for instance, refused to
accept the results of an election he lost. He then went to work attacking the
very government he sought to lead.
A CNN.com article listed what the
author, Marshall Cohen, considered Trump’s 10 worst abuses of power. There are
other similar lists, but Cohen’s summary is indicative of what sort of man
Republicans have embraced:
1. Subverting the 2020 election
2. Inciting an insurrection
3. Abusing the bully pulpit
4. Politicizing the Justice
Department
5. Obstructing the Mueller
investigation
6. Abusing the pardon power
7. The Ukraine affair and cover-up
8. Loyalty oaths and personalizing
government
9. Firing whistleblowers and
truth-tellers
10. Profiting off the presidency
Any one of these would be enough to discourage an honest
voter from supporting such a candidate. But the list is actually a lot longer
than 10. It includes a documented 30,573 false or misleading claims made during
the four years of his presidency. This is a man who simply cannot tell the
truth. And since Cohen’s list was compiled, we have learned that the former
president illegally took top secret documents to his home in Florida and
refused to relinquish them, resulting in a raid by the FBI, all of which has
caused his deluded followers to both defend his behavior and threaten the FBI.
If it had not been crystal clear
after four years of Trump’s corruption and incompetence that he is unfit to
hold any elected office, the January 6 commission’s hearings have left
Republicans with no credible excuse for supporting this man. But the primary
elections of 2022 have revealed a frightening possibility that state officials
who support the election lies will be willing to overturn the will of the
people and change election results simply because they do not like the outcome.
I listened to an interview recently with presidential historian Jon Meacham. He
warned that if a fair election is overturned by partisan officials who claim
fraud without evidence, the Constitution will then be gone, and once it is, it
will be almost impossible to restore. That is the danger we face, and that is
one reason among many why Latter-day Saints should refuse to support either
Donald Trump or any candidates who would do his bidding.
