Bob Woodward’s new book paints a damning picture of Josh Hawley’s ‘big role in the Big Lie’: Missouri newspaper

Bob Woodward and Robert Costa's new book, "Peril" takes a disturbing look at former President Donald Trump's final weeks in the White House. And according to the Kansas City Star's editorial board, the book paints an especially damning picture of one of Trump's worst enablers during that chaotic lame duck period: Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri. Hawley's refusal to accept the democratic results of the 2020 presidential election and his role in the January 6 insurrection are the focus of a scathing Star editorial published on September 29.

"Vice President Mike Pence, alas, had to be convinced not to end our democratic experiment," the Star's editorial board writes, "but he did come through in the end…. But you know who never caved to reality, or ever tried to protect the republic instead of his Republican self? Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, that's who. Yes, we knew that, but 'Peril' reminds any who might have forgotten that in putting his ambition ahead of all else, Hawley was a standout both before and during the attempted coup."

In "Peril," Woodward — who is famous for his reporting on Watergate with Washington Post colleague Carl Bernstein during the 1970s — and Costa write, "The risk became real when Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, a Yale-law educated freshman and former Supreme Court law clerk for Chief Justice John Roberts, announced on December 30 that he would object to the Electoral College certification on January 6, becoming the first senator to do so."

After the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol Building, Woodward and Costa note in their book, many senators "blamed" Hawley "for instigating the riot by announcing his opposition to the certification a week earlier."

"Hawley played a big role in the Big Lie," the Star's editorial board writes. "And since so many Missourians love him for it, he may be the rare national Republican who hopes his constituents will read this book, and see how willing he was to distinguish himself."