Utah Pol Bolts GOP After RNC: Party’s Direction ‘Makes Me Want To Cry’

Sen. Mark Madsen, of Eagle Mountain speaks during a committee hearing Monday, March 7, 2016, in Salt Lake City. Utah Representatives on Monday rejected a plan to legalize the use of edible marijuana products by those... Sen. Mark Madsen, of Eagle Mountain speaks during a committee hearing Monday, March 7, 2016, in Salt Lake City. Utah Representatives on Monday rejected a plan to legalize the use of edible marijuana products by those with chronic conditions. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer) MORE LESS
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A Utah state senator announced that he was leaving the GOP in despair after attending the Republican National Committee last week.

Sen. Mark Madsen (R-UT) said Monday that his experience as a Utah delegate confirmed all of his concerns about the future of the party.

“Every decision and inclination I had before was reinforced,” Madsen said in a press conference where he announced he would become a Libertarian, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.

Madsen, a three term senator from District 13, supported Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and was disappointed by convention-goers booing Cruz off stage when he urged Republicans to vote their conscience.

Like Cruz, Madsen seems himself as a strict constitutional conservative and believes that “the scales tipped” away in the Republican Party from an emphasis on states’ rights and entitlement reform.

The current direction of the party, he said Monday, “makes me want to cry.”

“I’ve invested a lot in that party,” Madsen said, according to the Tribune.

The Utah senator will retire at the end of this year and acknowledged that his announcement was “largely symbolic.”

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