SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Utah’s Republican governor. Spencer Cox came under fire on Wednesday for sending a campaign email that included a photo of him and former President Donald Trump at Arlington National Cemetery during a wreath-laying ceremony.
According to federal law, campaign or election-related activities are prohibited at US Army military cemeteries. This rule had already become widely known before the ceremony on Monday, it was said on Wednesday at Arlington National Cemetery.
Cox’s campaign team apologized for using the photo and for politicizing the memorial service honoring Sergeant Darin Taylor Hoover of Utah, one of 13 soldiers killed in a bomb attack on an airport during the Withdrawal from the Afghanistan war three years ago. The email asked for donations for Cox’s re-election.
“This was not a campaign event and was never intended for campaign use,” the governor wrote in a post on X. “It did not go through the proper channels and should not have been sent out.”
Trump’s election campaign The former president also faced a fierce backlash after a dispute broke out between his staff and a cemetery worker who tried to stop the team from filming and taking photographs at the gravesite. The former president had been invited by some of the families of the fallen soldiers. His campaign staff had been warned before their arrival and the dispute that photography was not allowed in that part of the cemetery, a defense official told the Associated Press on Wednesday.
Cox recently surprised voters when he pledged his support to Trump after he Assassinationalthough he had said on CNN days earlier that he did not vote for Trump in 2016 and 2020 and would not vote for him again this year.
Cox’s sudden embrace of Trump, who has not endorsed him, represents a puzzling departure from his carefully cultivated persona as Mitt Romney -like moderate.
His state is one of the few Republican strongholds that supported Trump half-heartedlywhose brash style and comments about refugees and immigrants have not gone down well with many members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. About half of Utah’s 3.4 million residents belong to the denomination commonly known as the Mormon Church.
The approval came one month after Cox easily won the primaries because of ardent Trump supporter Phil Lyman, who made false claims about voter fraud after the 2020 presidential election.
It is expected that Cox will easily be re-elected in the Republican-dominated state in November.
In addition to criticism in comments on his social media accounts, Cox’s opponent in November, Democratic Rep. Brian King, said it was disrespectful of Trump and Cox to use a veterans memorial event as a campaign photo opportunity and called on the Republican governor to withdraw his support for Trump.
