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In a state that gave former Republican President Donald Trump 57.8% of the state’s 2016 vote for president and 57.6% in the 2020 presidential election, Republican 3rd District U.S. Rep. Michael Guest found the courage to join 35 other Republican members of Congress in voting for an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection on Capitol Hill.
That vote bucked Trump and GOP House Minority Leader Kevin McCarty. The vote drew immediate criticism from the Trump faction in the national GOP and criticism on social media in Mississippi.
Guest’s vote aligned him with the state’s only Democratic congressman, 2nd District U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson of Bolton – the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee who led negotiations on behalf of his party for establishment of the commission.
In recent days, pro-Trump media figures and Republican lawmakers have tried to justify the Trump campaign’s efforts to overturn the president’s electoral loss on the basis that there are many people who believe it was rigged. Needless to say, this is absurd.
On Wednesday, when Congress meets to count the electoral votes, more than 100 House Republicans and a dozen Republican senators plan to object to the tally. The event, which is usually just a formality, represents a last-ditch effort to keep Trump in power following dozens of failed and baseless lawsuits. Right-wing media, especially Fox, have been bolstering Republican efforts with persistent coverage about supposed election fraud.