Let us pause to praise Sen. Josh Hawley—not for his politics, which have long been a sweaty blend of culture-war cosplay and Jan. 6-adjacent grandstanding, but for his remarkable restraint.
In response to a historic rebuke from the American people, Hawley could have chosen an empty gesture so extreme it might actually have hurt him: self-flagellation, resignation, taking responsibility, admitting that the MAGA mentality and the conservative movement’s incompetence and corruption were overwhelmingly rejected at the ballot box. He chose none of those. Good for him.
Instead, Hawley announced a one-hour fast and prayer session at the Capitol—Tuesday, December 15, from noon to 1 p.m. Sixty minutes. The length of an NFL game. A lunch delay with a press release.
“Meet me there!” he wrote on X, apparently mistaking a midterm shellacking for a calendar invite. The man didn’t fast; he had a late lunch and called it a “historic response.”
This is the genius of the Hawley approach. A one-hour fast is precisely calibrated to cost him nothing, risk him nothing, and change him nothing—while offering the public nothing in the way of penance or correction.
It is not self-flagellation; it’s not even self-denial. It’s a photo op with a 空腹 aesthetic.
He could have fasted forty days in the desert, as Christ did, but he has a Senate seat to keep and a book to sell.
He could have taken responsibility for the chaos his movement has produced, but that would hurt.
He could have offered correction—dropping the abortion-pill crusade, the election denial, the performative cruelty—but that would require admitting the voters were right.
So he chose the one gesture that maximizes visibility and minimizes inconvenience: skip lunch, call it repentance.
The internet, to its credit, saw through it immediately. Former Obama staffer Tommy Vietor replied, “A whole hour?” Christopher Hale noted the obvious ratio: “Christ fasted for 40 days and nights in the desert. Josh Hawley and MAGA will only give our nation an hour.” A pro-Democratic group pledged, “In solidarity, we will also wait until 1 PM to have lunch.”
One account translated the stunt with brutal precision: “I’m not paying for lunch.” Even Hawley’s own colleagues reportedly chuckled.
Rep. Gwen Moore quoted Matthew 25 back at him: “For I was hungry and you gave me food… whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
Charlotte Clymer offered Matthew 6:5: “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others.”
Sarah Matthews, a former Trump White House aide, summed it up: “Sending Josh Hawley thoughts and prayers. I’m told that’s an adequate response to a massacre.”
And the context makes the absurdity sharper. Hawley wasn’t on the ballot. He avoided the midterm carnage that took out dozens of his Republican colleagues, watched voters send a wave of Democrats to Washington, and decided the appropriate response was a 60-minute prayer meeting steps from where the mob he encouraged rampaged on Jan. 6.
This is a man who participated in a 72-hour prayer session for Missouri legislation restricting abortion—legislation Missourians then rejected—and who now wants us to believe that skipping lunch for an hour is a historic act of national repentance.
It isn’t repentance. It’s content. It’s the conservative movement’s favorite sacrament: the empty gesture.
Meanwhile, the rest of MAGA’s response to the midterms has been equally bankrupt.
Donald Trump, according to The New York Times’ Peter Baker, has sounded “like a man in denial”—signing a steel beam for his new White House ballroom and flying to Florida to give a speech on the space program while his party picks through the wreckage.
Unlike Bush after the 2006 “thumping” or Obama after the 2010 “shellacking,” Trump has offered “no expression of humility or much recognition of public discontent with him.”
The White House’s contribution to democratic accountability was an online message: “TRUMP IS STILL YOUR PRESIDENT.” So the party that just got trounced has responded with two things: a president who won’t admit it and a senator who won’t eat lunch about it. That’s not a historic response. It’s a historic inability to read the room.
The American people overwhelmingly rejected the MAGA mentality—the chaos, the corruption, the incompetence, the endless culture-war auditions.
They wanted governance; Hawley offered a lunch schedule. They wanted accountability; he offered a calendar invite. They wanted correction; he offered a rumbling stomach and a press release.
He didn’t choose self-flagellation because that would hurt. He didn’t choose responsibility because that would require acknowledging the voters. He didn’t choose penance because that would require change.
He chose a one-hour fast—a gesture so small, so empty, so obviously calibrated for the algorithm that it makes “thoughts and prayers” look like a policy platform.
So yes, praise Josh Hawley. In a moment that demanded accountability, he gave us a photo op. In a moment that demanded correction, he gave us a late lunch. In a moment when voters rejected MAGA, he gave us MAGA’s favorite move: the empty gesture dressed up as sacrifice.
He didn’t flagellate himself. He didn’t take responsibility. He didn’t offer the public penance or correction. He just skipped lunch and called it historic.
The only thing emptier than Josh Hawley’s stomach that day was the gesture itself—and the movement that produced it.
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