Jeff Van Drew, New Jersey Congressman, speaks during the fourth day of the virtual Republican National Convention on August 27, 2020. (Photo by RNC 2020 via Sipa USA) ***EDITORIAL USE ONLY***
2020 Republican National Convention – Day 4
TRENTON, NJ (AP) — US Representative Jeff Van Drew is the only member of New Jersey’s congressional delegation to oppose certifying Joe Biden’s win over President Donald Trump.
The pro-Trump protesters who overtook police to mob the Capitol on Wednesday didn’t change his mind, said Van Drew, a Republican.
“It’s two different things. I know some people might not agree with me on the certification process,” he said in an Associated Press interview Wednesday. “It’s not so much that I want to overturn the election. It is the fact that some really, really — if everybody would clear there head and look at this — that some really wrong things did happen.”
The president challenged election results in a handful of states in dozens of court cases, none of which uncovered the kind of fraud Trump wrongly says affected the election.
Van Drew said he has met constituents who tell him they believe in the unproven fraud.
New Jersey’s two Democratic senators, Cory Booker and Bob Menendez, both supported certification, along with the 11 other representatives.
The only other Republican representing New Jersey in Congress, Chris Smith, voted to certify Biden’s victory in the November election.
The violence at the Capitol has led to calls for Trump to be removed under the 25th Amendment as well as for him to be impeached a second time after he called on his supporters to fight not long before his supporters stormed the Capitol.
New Jersey is sending 500 National Guard troops to Washington to help “protect our democracy and facilitate the peaceful transition of power,” Democratic Governor Phil Murphy said Thursday in a statement.
Van Drew a year ago welcomed Trump to Wildwood for a rally, a reward for Van Drew leaving the Democratic Party for the GOP over the president’s impeachment.
Van Drew won his first term in Congress in 2018 as a Democrat, but he left the party in December 2019, saying he felt pressured to support impeaching Trump, even though he didn’t. He had been a longtime state lawmaker and had a reputation as a conservative Democrat while serving in the Assembly and state Senate.
