Will the GOP’s reckoning over the 2020 ‘big lie’ ever happen?

A couple of weeks ago, when Rep. Jim Jordan’s bid for House speaker still appeared viable, Rep. Dan Crenshaw sat down with CNN’s Jake Tapper to express his support for the right-wing Ohioan. The host noted that Jordan was one of the many Republicans who tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election and asked whether that gave Crenshaw pause.

“A lot of them did that,” the Texas Republican responded. “If I held that grudge, I wouldn’t have friends in the Republican Conference, because a lot of them did that.”

A few days later, Rep. Don Bacon, ostensibly one of the Republican conference’s less reactionary members, also spoke to Tapper about the same subject. When the CNN anchor asked the Nebraskan whether he was bothered by Jordan’s role in the effort to overturn the 2020 results, Bacon replied: “Well, I disagreed with it; I voted to certify the election. But truth be told, about half of our conference ...”

It was at that point when Tapper interrupted the congressman to remind Bacon that it was actually two-thirds of the House Republican conference that voted to reject the results of a free and fair election because they didn’t like the outcome.

Both of these interviews were notable for the same reason: Relatively mainstream GOP congressmen, at least by 2023 standards, were asked about the prospect of elevating an unapologetic election denier to one of the most important positions in the United States government. They both effectively shrugged, noting how common election denialism was, and is, among Republicans on Capitol Hill.

Soon after, Jordan’s bid failed — Crenshaw voted for him, while Bacon did not — and the party turned to House Majority Whip Tom Emmer. But the Minnesotan also failed, in part because he wasn’t enough of an election denier.

At that point, desperate GOP members nominated then-House Republican Conference Vice Chair Mike Johnson, an election denier who went considerably further than most of his colleagues to keep Donald Trump in power despite his defeat.

It was against this backdrop that Politico published a report asking a good question: “Can the GOP ever come to grips with the lies of 2020?”

It’s easy to forget — a lot has happened in the last 34 months — but in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, it would’ve seemed implausible that by October 2023, the Republican Party would still be putting off any serious reckoning over Trump, his “big lie” and the party’s role in trying to undermine democracy.

And yet, here we are. The GOP isn’t coming to grips with the party’s election lies, in large part because the party can’t seem to bring itself to care.

Soon after securing his party’s nomination for speaker, Johnson held a brief news conference, which included a question about his efforts to overturn the results from 2020. Johnson blew off the question, but not before Republican members booed the journalist who asked the legitimate question and told her “shut up.”

It was a reminder, not only of the degree to which the GOP has normalized anti-election efforts, but also of the Republican Party’s eagerness to avoid real consequences for their plot to hand illegitimate power to a president who’d just been rejected by his country’s electorate.

The day after Johnson’s news conference, shortly before the vote that made the Louisiana Republican speaker, House Democratic Conference Chairman Pete Aguilar delivered floor remarks in which he noted that Johnson was an architect of the post-2020 anti-election scheme. At that moment, Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida yelled out, “Damn right!” — as if Johnson’s undemocratic scheme was worth celebrating.

It was only two words, but the interruption spoke volumes about the state of the party and its decision to avoid a reckoning over what happened nearly three years ago.