Utah Sen. Mike Lee has a bit of a quandary: Three of his best friends in the Senate are all mounting presidential campaigns, and he says he has not endorsed any of them.
The Republican lawmaker is close with Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Ted Cruz of Texas and Marco Rubio of Florida, telling ABC
"This Week" host George Stephanopoulos Sunday that the three are "among my best friends and closest allies in the Senate" and he wants to be as helpful as he can be with their campaigns.
But at the end of the day, he said, the candidate with the most "principled, positive" adherence to the conservative base policy will be the one who takes away the 2016 GOP nomination.
Paul, Cruz, and Rubio all have their own unique qualities, said Lee. Paul, with his Libertarian leanings, believes in limited government and understands the risk of too much government intervention. Cruz, he said, is passionate and "memorized the Constitution at six months old," and Rubio "speaks in a way that conjures up emotion" and brings "natural political talent" to the race.
Lee, who has written a new book
"Our Lost Constitution," also discussed the role of Congress in a time when the president is passing several executive orders, and said the nation's founders would most likely be "surprised" that Congress is "willing and eager to delegate its responsibility."
The founding fathers rejected the idea of forming a monarchy, he pointed out, and would be "very surprised one person gets so much power."
Related stories:
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.