Freshman GOP Reps. Peter Meijer and Nancy Mace emerge as Trump critics

Rep. Peter Meijer, 32, of Michigan, made his displeasure of the president’s role in the intrusion known in an op-ed for the Detroit News.

“While the Capitol was being assaulted by his supporters who were duped into believing the election was in fact a landslide victory and the true results could be overturned, Trump egged on these violent delusions,” Meijer wrote. “If the Republican party ever hopes to regain the public’s trust and lead the country forward after this heinous assault, it must first be honest with itself.”

Rep. Nancy Mace, 43, of South Carolina, also expressed her frustration soon after the insurrection.

“Everything that he’s worked for … all of that, his entire legacy, was wiped out yesterday,” Mace told Politico the morning after the siege. “We’ve got to start over.”

Coming out against Trump and his supporters could put Mace and Meijer under scrutiny by members of their own party.

“They’re going get some blowback from some of their voters. No doubt about it,” said biographer and presidential historian Craig Shirley.

But in a party enraged over the Capitol breach and divided about the way the party moves forward in the future, they might not experience the same blowback from Republican leadership. Internal division, after all, has been a frequent feature of the party’s politics.

“There will be more tolerance for more viewpoints right now than there has been in the last four years,” Shirley said. “You might sum it up as Trumpism versus Reaganism over what is the future of the Republican Party. And it’s not anything new. The party has been split in the past between Taft and Eisenhower, between Nixon and Lodge, between Goldwater and Rockefeller.”

“This fight is different though,” Shirley added, “because everybody is more or less conservative. It’s over style and character, and what works better for the future for the Republican Party. Does Reagan-style work better, or does Donald Trump-style work better?”

If all goes well for the two representatives, they could be laying the groundwork for the future of the Republican House Conference and a more presentable tone to the public.

Meijer replaced outgoing Republican-turned-independent-turned-Libertarian Rep. Justin Amash in Michigan’s 3rd District, which encompasses part of Grand Rapids. His family owns the Grand Rapids-based Meijer supermarket chain, and financial disclosures show that his net worth is over $50 million. But Meijer boasts more relatable credentials as an Army Reserve veteran and was deployed to Iraq, where he was an intelligence adviser.

Amash heaped praise on Meijer in response to the op-ed. “Thank you, Peter, for staying true to your convictions,” he wrote on Twitter on Sunday.

Meijer drew a line in the sand categorizing Republicans in his op-ed.

“While a dead woman’s blood dried mere feet from our chamber, other Republican colleagues doubled down, repeating lies of a stolen election, baselessly deflecting blame for the Capitol assault from Trump loyalists to Antifa, doing whatever they could to justify, equivocate, rationalize or otherwise avoid taking responsibility for the consequences of their actions,” Meijer said. “Blood has been spilled, and those who encouraged this insurrection are in too deep.”

Mace, who was the first woman to graduate from the Corps of Cadets program at The Citadel military college, ran a close race against former Democratic Rep. Joe Cunningham and defeated him in November. The coastal Charleston-area representative hasn’t previously been shy about making a splash about controversial topics, recently volunteering that she does not think members of Congress should receive the coronavirus vaccine before front-line workers.

In elaborating on her comments to MSNBC, Mace recognized the electoral success that Trump spurred, saying that he is “one of the reasons we flipped so many seats this year,” setting up the challenge over which message will unite Republicans while also energizing the Trump-loving portion of the electorate.