A leading Senate conservative says the aim of his new book is to remind Americans of the importance of the nation’s founding documents in responding to government overreach.
“The book is my latest effort in an attempt to make clear to the American people that what we’re facing today with overreaching big government is nothing new,” Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, a New York Times best-selling author, said of his new book.
Lee made his remarks on the fifth installment of the House Freedom Caucus’ new podcast series hosted by Rep. Jody Hice, R-Ga.
Lee’s book, “Our Lost Declaration: America’s Fight Against Tyranny From King George to the Deep State,” is set for release April 23 and is available for preorder on Amazon.
The Utah Republican said he has found that history—both good and bad—tends to repeat itself.
“Many of the things that we face from the government today in the … so-called deep state, for example, are similar to things that we faced around the time of the American Revolution,” Lee said. “That’s not to say that we’re in an apocalyptic era, or an era that necessarily needs to be followed by a revolution—a formal revolution, as historians would put it—but it is rather an era in which, like every other era, people will abuse government if they can.”
He said America chose to become an independent country to protect the freedoms and values it was founded on.
“That’s why we have a Declaration of Independence, and that’s why we have a Constitution, and people will always find a way to abuse it,” Lee said. “They will abuse it to the extent that they can without consequences. And so that is why it’s so important to remind ourselves that we have the keys, the tools at our disposal, to reclaim our own government.”
Lee also touted the criminal justice reform bill, which he helped write and which was signed into law by President Donald Trump in December.
“Criminal justice reform was a huge step forward,” he said. “This was something I worked on for eight years, and it was an honor finally to get it signed into law a few months ago.”
There’s another bill that Lee said he would like to see enacted.
“If I had a magic wand, and I could wave one magic wand as far as legislative reform, policy reform, it would be to pass the REINS Act, which would require that any new executive branch agency action that has a major impact on the American economy would have to be affirmatively enacted into law by both houses of Congress,” he said.
The Utah senator explained that the legislative power does not belong in the executive branch and must be given back to Congress.
“We’ve got to return that to the legislative branch, because for decades now, for about the last 80 years, we’ve seen a deliberate shift of policy-making power from the legislative branch over to the executive branch,” he said.
Listen to the full podcast here:
