Based Mike Lee

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About

Based Mike Lee is the Twitter alter ego of Utah Senator Mike Lee, a Republican who has been in office since 2011. On August 10th, 2022, posters online who had previously thought the account was a gimmick made by a fan of Mike Lee realized it was his personal account after his official Facebook page shared a tweet from the account and a source close to the Senator confirmed that Lee was the sole admin of the Twitter page. Based Mike Lee is notorious for posting tweets featuring Gen Z slang, particularly bussin, and Zoomerification memes.

Online History

Based Mike Lee established his Twitter alt in July 2022 and first posted on July 24th. That same day, Based Mike Lee tweeted the tweet seen below, using Zoomer slang. The tweet received just over 400 likes in two weeks and was in response to a tweet by right-wing media personality Benny Johnson.^[1]

Based Mike Lee went on to post about how he felt “free to tweet whatever I want,” also on July 24th (see below). He frequently goes days without posting before posting several tweets on the same day.^[2]

Identity Revealed

Based Mike Lee’s identity was revealed to a wider audience not by his Zoomer slang tweets, but by a tweet more typical of a Republican senator. This August 8th, 2022, tweet (seen below) criticizing the FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago received almost 50,000 likes in two days.^[3]

The tweet was posted to Mike Lee’s official Facebook page, leading the Salt Lake Tribune to inquire about the account and confirm, after checking with Lee’s staff, that it did in fact belong to the senator.^[4]

Online reaction to Based Mike Lee was largely flabbergasted but appreciative. One such tweet by Twitter user @sambrodey revealing the account received just under 4,500 likes in two days (seen below).^[5]

Based Mike Lee 2022 Election

Mike Lee is currently running for re-election against Evan McMullin, a conservative independent supported by the Democratic Party as their best chance to unseat Lee.^[6]

On August 10th, 2022, McMullin criticized the Based Mike Lee account in a tweet thread. Based Mike Lee replied by quote-tweeting McMullin and saying #Libscantmeme.^[7] In a subsequent reply, Lee claimed to have ratioed McMullen. However, it appears that Based Mike Lee selectively quote-tweeted the second tweet in a thread posted by McMullin, and at the time of his ratio declaration, both the first and third tweets in that thread exceeded the number of likes on Lee's quote-tweet. Based Mike Lee's August 11th ratio, posted just after midnight Washington, D.C. time, is perceived as a ratio by technicality.

The 2022 Utah Senate race between Lee and McMullin joined the 2022 Pennsylvania Senate race between Dr. Oz and John Fetterman as an election where meme culture was deployed by candidates for political gain.