What a Trump victory could mean for Utah Sen. Mike Lee

Utah Sen. Mike Lee entered Congress in 2011 with the goal of proving that firm principles can defeat partisan forces. In a matter of years, the pages of National Affairs, TIME and The New York Times all declared Lee the face of intellectual tea party conservatism in the U.S. Senate.
Then came former President Donald Trump’s disruption of the Republican Party, realigning voters and bringing with him a series of more populist policies. Lee and his GOP colleagues have tried to navigate this change, in a careful dance between supporting Trump while trying to stay true to the conservative priorities that brought them to Congress in the first place.
In a shift from his early begrudging support — Lee did not vote for Trump in 2016 — Utah’s senior senator is now seen as loyal to Trump in the apparent belief that the future of conservatism lies in the hands of a man who shares Lee’s desire to remake Washington D.C., by dismantling the “deep state” — the network of executive agencies that conservatives like Lee see as usurping congressional authority.
While Trump’s commitment to Lee’s small-government vision is uncertain, some of those who have worked closest with Lee say his relationship to the former president could be what finally gives him the platform to make his initial ambitions of principled constitutional conservatism a reality. The results of Tuesday’s presidential and Senate elections could catapult Lee into significant positions of influence in the Senate, White House, or perhaps the Department of Justice.
If Trump takes back the chief executive’s office and Republicans take control of Congress’ upper chamber, Lee could become the president’s chief liaison with the Senate, granting legislative wishes for Trump, as well as securing policy wins for Utah, according to former chiefs of staff to Lee and Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, as well as other political observers interviewed for this story.
The Deseret News reached out to Lee through his office but he was unavailable for an interview.
The outcome of the 2024 presidential race could also bring a new opportunity that would pull him from the Senate; he is considered a candidate to head Trump’s Justice Department as attorney general, or solicitor general, a position his father, Rex E. Lee, held from 1981-1985. Such an appointment would empower Lee to either magnify or constrain the “lawfare” he has condemned as evidenced, many Republicans say, by the court cases brought against Trump.
Lee’s sway in the Senate is likely to increase even if Vice President Kamala Harris secures the presidency. The Senate appears poised to flip for Republicans, giving Lee a say in who controls the body and potentially advancing him to the chair of a coveted committee that oversees public lands and energy. On Nov. 12, Lee will moderate a forum between Senate leadership candidates as he works to solidify his role as a “power broker” for Senate conservatives who want to see major procedural changes in the next term.
Like most of his Republican colleagues, Lee has entered into what sources described to the Deseret News as a “bargain” or a “transaction” through his close connection to Trump. On Nov. 5, and in the months that follow, Utahns will watch to see whether Lee’s support of the former president pays off.
In 2022, Lee won reelection to his third term representing Utah in the Senate with 55% of the vote against independent candidate Evan McMullin, who won 41% of the vote. McMullin ran on a platform of criticizing Lee for allegedly putting Trump’s ambitions to stay in office over the country’s wellbeing.
McMullin — who in the 2016 presidential race received the vote of 21% of Utahns, including that of Lee — argued that private text messages revealed Lee had played an active role in helping the Trump campaign explore legal pathways to contest the results of the 2020 election.
Lee said there was no evidence he had participated in the effort to find fake electors as the two candidates debated their personal loyalty to the U.S. Constitution, with Lee arguing he would always put Utah before his relationship with Trump.
Utah’s presence in a potential future Trump White House may depend precisely on that relationship. According to Lee’s first chief of staff, Lee’s rapport with the GOP nominee for president positions Utah to punch above its weight on the national scene.
“I don’t know who has a stronger relationship than (Lee) with Donald Trump in the Senate,” said Spencer Stokes, president of Stokes Strategies and Lee’s chief of staff from 2011-2013. “It looks likely that there’ll be a Trump victory, and in that case Mike Lee’s going to have a lot of access to the White House, which will be good for Utah and Utahns, and it will be good for conservatism.”
Lee will be leaned on “heavily” as a leader in the Senate under a second Trump administration, Stokes said. Despite their ideological differences on spending and trade, Lee has shown he can work with the GOP standard-bearer on significant shared interests. In 2018, the former president endorsed Lee’s bipartisan First Step Act, which represented the biggest criminal justice overhaul in decades.
A lot has changed in six years. During the first Trump administration, Lee found himself in opposition to the president on increasing the budget, ultimately voting with Trump slightly less than Utah Sen. Mitt Romney. Now, according to Romney’s former chief of staff, Matt Waldrip, Lee will be Trump’s go-to man in the Senate.
“I think he’ll be call No. 1, call No. 2, perhaps, of Trump,” Waldrip said.
There were times when Waldrip said he would have described Lee as “obstructionist” — more focused on halting bad legislation than bringing players to the table for negotiations.
Under the Obama and Biden administrations, Lee made his mark by using Senate procedure to protest what he saw as unconstitutional provisions — causing a partial government shutdown in 2013 in an attempt to block Obamacare, vowing to halt all confirmations of Biden appointees after Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts in what Lee characterized as “a political cudgel,” and supporting Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s efforts to blockade military nominations over abortion coverage.
A decade ago, Jonah Goldberg, a best-selling author and columnist, said he identified with Lee’s brand of “conservative purist.” Lee represented a policy-focused faction of the GOP that was willing to be unpopular in order to uphold limited government principles. But, according to Goldberg, who co-founded The Dispatch after two decades as an editor at National Review, many of even the most principled disciples of limited government have now resorted to obstruction for the sake of pleasing Trump’s base as opposed to realizing reforms that will actually reduce federal spending.
“A partial win is seen as collaboration with the enemy, but a complete failure is seen as standing on principle,” Goldberg said. “But that’s the easy position to take because it proves how principled you are if you get nothing because you you held out for the most principled thing. The hard political thing is to figure out how partial a win you can get.”
If Vice President Kamala Harris wins on Nov. 5, Waldrip expects Lee’s role “will remain as it has been for many years.” But if Trump returns to the Oval Office, Lee’s role “changes dramatically.”
The way Waldrip sees it, Lee’s total embrace of Trump, whether it be on the campaign trail or his “Based Mike Lee” account on X, suggests that unquestioned loyalty on Lee’s part may become key in facilitating Trump’s agenda in Congress.
“I think the name of the game for him now is not championing any particular issue, but rather doing Trump’s bidding and thus he’ll get done for President Trump, whatever President Trump wants done,” Waldrip said. “And he’s now been in the Senate long enough that he has figured out how to do that, and so he’ll be effective at it.”
The lack of daylight between Lee and Trump doesn’t mean Lee will simply acquiesce to Trump’s demands, according to Stokes. Stokes believes Lee’s “hate” for the national debt outweighs his loyalty to the former president.
A recent analysis by the nonprofit Committee for a Responsible Budget found that Trump’s proposed economic plans would likely increase the debt by around $7.75 trillion — nearly double what Harris’ proposed plans are estimated to generate.
Lee will be able to curb much of this spending by wielding his new status in Trump’s orbit to provide “more input on the front end” of Trump’s proposals before Lee is tasked with promoting them in the Senate, Stokes said.
But one Utah Republican operative, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said counting on Lee’s commitment to Trump to be reciprocated is unrealistic.
“I’m one of those who believes that Trump doesn’t have relationships with anybody. I think it’s a transaction,” the operative said.
And Lee may not be willing to give Trump what he’s hoping for.
Lee is known for placing principle above pragmatism, voting “no” on anything that crosses his “core beliefs” of limited government constitutionalism, the source said. While Lee explored legal options for Trump’s 2020 election challenges, in what many critics describe as an effort by Trump and his supporters to overturn the election, Lee ultimately told Trump nothing could be done and certified the results. It is Lee’s tendency to draw a line in the sand that limits Trump’s reliance on him, the source said.
“I think the biggest dilemma is Trump wants that absolute loyalty and allegiance and Lee won’t do that,” the source said. “So even though he could be a natural ally on a number of things, I don’t think he becomes a de facto leader or something, just because Trump doesn’t function that way.”
After four years as one of Trump’s staunchest defenders, former Vice President Mike Pence said he saw a permanent rift form between himself and the president when Trump “demanded that I choose between him and the Constitution.” Pence, in his own words, “chose the Constitution” during the certification of election results on Jan. 6, 2021, and was subsequently alienated from his onetime running mate and political party.
While Lee appears in good standing with some of Trump’s biggest advocates, like radio hosts Tucker Carlson and Charlie Kirk, recent decisions from the Trump campaign have done little to highlight Trump’s relationship with Lee.
In April, Trump endorsed Riverton Mayor Trent Staggs in Utah’s race for U.S. Senate despite Lee reportedly campaigning “vigorously” for Trump to endorse Moxie Pest Control CEO Jason Walton. In June, Trump endorsed Rep. Celeste Maloy in Utah’s 2nd Congressional District race despite Lee endorsing and investing heavily in her opponent, Colby Jenkins. In July, the Trump campaign selected 11 sitting senators to speak at the Republican National Convention; Lee did not speak at the event.
Since Trump became the de facto face of the Republican Party — and, for many, the face of conservatism — Republicans have justified their support by claiming that despite his character flaws, Trump will achieve the conservative policies they both want. But the opposite has often been true, according to Goldberg.
Much-cited policy wins, like the 2017 tax cuts and conservative judicial nominations to the Supreme Court, were actually brokered by “establishment” figures like former House Speaker Paul Ryan, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnel, R-Ky., Goldberg said. What Trump has delivered in trade for Republicans’ support, Goldberg contends, is a watered down version of what it means to be conservative on abortion, spending and personal behavior.
“The bargain ends up being garbage because it is really a rationalization for something else entirely,” Goldberg said. “They basically rewrote the definition of what a conservative and what a Republican leader should look like to fit the man.”
However, Lee is poised to bring Utah to the decision table regardless of who wins the presidency.
As chair of the Senate Steering Committee, Lee has outlined what the Senate’s most conservative members require from candidates running to replace McConnell as Senate majority leader. The demands include creating a binding budget schedule, crafting concrete policy goals for the GOP caucus and carving out four weeks to debate and amend spending packages.
With the leadership race leaving multiple vacancies, Lee is also in line to become the senior Republican on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. This role will place Lee on the front edge of one of Trump’s biggest campaign promises: to drastically increase domestic energy production.
“For the first time in a very long time, conservative policies on energy will be at the forefront of the discussions, and we can see that those policies will be the most effective for reliable sources of energy that also allow for the best growth and future for this nation,” said Lee’s chief strategist, Dan Hauser.
As chair of the committee, Lee will also be able to take many of his proposals to benefit Utah directly to the White House, regardless of who sits in it, Hauser said. Trump has already endorsed more than one piece of Lee-sponsored legislation, even incorporating it into his presidential campaigning, Hauser said.
According to Hauser, Trump has expressed support for Lee’s HOUSES Act, which would open some public land for affordable housing; his SAVE Act, which would require proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections; and his REINS Act, which would make Congress approve actions by executive agencies with more than a $100 million impact.
Utah GOP chair Rob Axson predicts Lee will play “a very important role of being that liaison with the president,” particularly on those priorities they share.
“You’re already seeing that Sen. Lee’s priorities and ideas that he’s been working on for years have made their way into President Trump’s agenda. And I think you’ll start to see more and more of that cross pollination should President Trump be elected,” said Axson, who previously worked as Lee’s state director. “That cannot be overstated what an opportunity that creates for Utahns.”
But if Trump is reelected, Lee’s legislative vision could be put on hold with one call. From extensive conversations with Washington, D.C., insiders, Waldrip said it is “very possible” that Trump taps Lee as his attorney general, representing the United States in legal challenges and providing legal advice to the president.
“I give it certainly a greater than 50% chance,” Waldrip said. Another source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said he had heard from multiple individuals that Lee is on a “shortlist” of AG candidates.
In this role, Lee would be the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government, tasked with prosecuting claims of criminal activity or defending against lawsuits on behalf of the country. Trump has said the Department of Justice should pursue prosecution of several of his political opponents, including President Joe Biden, Harris and members of Congress on the Jan. 6 committee, among others.
Trump says Biden has already done the same to him after current Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed a special counsel to oversee criminal investigations against Trump.
Lee has not clearly said whether he would accept the appointment as attorney general. But for Waldrip, Lee is a clear pick for the position.
“If I’m Donald Trump, I’d put Mike Lee at the very top of that list because he’s clearly shown that he, one, fully and completely understands the MAGA base, two, relates to them, and, three, will execute on the MAGA or America first agenda,” Waldrip said.
While “there is no question that Mike is on those kinds of lists,” according to Stokes, the more important question may be in what position Lee “becomes more valuable to Donald Trump.”
“And my hunch is he becomes more valuable in the Senate,” Stokes said.