GOP candidate Trevor Lee ran a secret Twitter account that attacked LGBTQ people and Utah Gov. Cox. Now he’s been rebuked by Republican leadership. -…

Utah House candidate Republican Trevor Lee is behind a recently deleted Twitter account that elevated conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, attacked women and members of the LGBTQ community, made false statements about the coronavirus pandemic and frequently used the #DezNat hashtag in support of the conservative religious philosophy.

Lee, who defeated longtime Republican Steve Handy for the GOP nomination in Utah House District 16, operated the @ballinlee Twitter account that used the screen name Truth seeker. The account disappeared from the platform earlier this month, within hours of The Salt Lake Tribune contacting Lee about his association with it. Lee took the account private shortly after filing to run for office in March.

During an interview, Lee admitted he owned the account. So why did he take it offline?

The world we live in now. I can say something that I may not think is controversial, Lee said, but the world is changing to a point where it thinks it is.

Those comments included calling Republican Gov. Spencer Cox spineless for supporting transgender girls in athletics; using a derogatory term for transgender people after publicly apologizing for using it initially; and saying Brigham Young University was a progressive cesspool that needs to be cleansed.

GOP House leaders expressed shock when they were informed of Lees social media account, making it clear they were unaware.

Presenting one face publicly while posting demeaning comments behind a hidden Twitter account is disrespectful to the people and the electoral process, said Utah House Speaker Brad Wilson, R-Kaysville. I am deeply disappointed that a candidate for the Utah House of Representatives did not have this same commitment to transparency.

House Majority Leader Mike Schultz, R-Hooper, said Utah lawmakers, even aspiring ones, should not hide behind anonymous online personas.

These private, anonymous tweets in no way reflect the values of the House of Representatives or the majority caucus. We collectively shake our heads at these types of Pierre DeLecto-type Twitter accounts, meant to conceal a persons identity and convey statements or observations that the author would not want to openly stand by, Schultz said, referencing Sen. Mitt Romneys onetime anonymous Twitter account.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

Lees now-deleted Twitter account included a profile picture featuring an umbrella emblazoned with FamProc shielding a house that says The Family from a rainbow.

The imagery is common to DezNat, or the Deseret Nation movement, which is a group of self-appointed defenders of the doctrines of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. FamProc is short for family proclamation, the 1995 proclamation from the church that defines marriage as between a man and a woman and advocates for traditional gender roles for men and women.

The 13-star Betsy Ross flag, representing the first colonies, was used as the background. Lee posted more than 16,000 times before the social media platform was wiped.

Lees account wasnt always so anonymous. According to posts saved on the Internet Archive, Lees Twitter screen name was simply Trevor as recently as January. Older archived posts show he used his own picture as an avatar.

According to the archived webpages and screenshots of posts provided to The Tribune, Lees account was littered with controversial, and often trolling, hate-filled posts including attacking the LGBTQ community.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

On May 25, 2021, Lee posted a meme featuring Ned Stark from Game of Thrones and more than a dozen corporate logos with rainbow colors, saying, Brace yourself, June is coming.

#lds #Deznat separate the wheat from the tares! Lee added.

In June, Lee replied to a post that claimed the message of Pride Month is satanic with, Gosh, this is amazing.

Doing things that are explicit, you know, people that are topless, that are running around in underwear and they have children there. Yeah, I think thats satanic. I think thats horrible, Lee said during an interview.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

In April, he highlighted a meme in support of Floridas controversial Dont Say Gay law, which prohibits classroom instruction on sexual orientation in a manner that is not age-appropriate.

Hate speech directed toward LGBTQ people exploded online after Florida passed the law, The Associated Press reported.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

Lee attacked Cox later that month when he responded to a suggestion that the Utah Jazz move to Las Vegas. Lee said, Yes, than (sic) our spineless governor can stop acting like he needs to let transsexuals destroy our girls in sports.

In another post, Lee wished the Utah governor had some balls to support a law like one passed by Texas lawmakers last year requiring public school athletes to compete against others of the same biological gender, even if they had a different gender identity.

Lee was referencing Coxs veto of a bill to block transgender athletes from participating in girls sports in Utah.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

After being criticized for using a slur to describe transgender people on a right-wing podcast earlier this year, Lee publicly apologized for using the slur on his Facebook page, vowing to remove it from his vocabulary.

However, Lee also responded with his anonymous Twitter account to a post about the story by saying, When did the word Tranny (sic) become a slur?

Using that particular slur was not a one-off for Lee. There are multiple examples of transphobic content.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

After a post complaining about a joke about trans people made during elders quorum a Sunday meeting for male Latter-day Saints Lee replied, Trans people need help. Lets never encourage what theyre doing.

Posts show Lee was a supporter of the DezNat movement, but he says he recently has distanced himself.

In 2021, he and several other DezNat enthusiasts got into a Twitter spat with the wife of a high school classmate about Julie Hanks, a prominent therapist who is a Latter-day Saint. Hanks has frequently drawn the ire of DezNat followers for her focus on emotional health and relationship skills.

That dispute did not stay online. According to text messages shared with The Tribune, Lee reached out to the womans husband to warn him that his wife was a fan of Hanks, who he said tells members to go against Gods words and leaders.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

After the man defended his wife, Lee extolled the virtues of DezNat, directing him to the Official DezNat User Guide. He offered to connect him with a man he referred to as JP meaning J.P. Bellum, who coined the #DezNat hashtag.

Theres a lot of misconceptions about the hashtag and how its used. I was saying if you want to learn, go read that article and the reasoning behind that, Lee said in a text. Lee added that he knows JP personally, but did not realize his involvement with DezNat until after he had gotten involved with the movement.

The Tribune will not share the name of the person who provided the text messages to prevent further harassment. Lee acknowledged the texts are real.

Because Im still in the church and willing to talk about hard things, Hanks told The Tribune, I have become a place where people with questions or criticisms of the church feel comfortable.

Back online, Lee was not shy about expressing his feelings toward Hanks. In response to a post that asserts Hanks teaches her followers to leave the church, Lee said, She will be held accountable.

Hanks said she has no agenda to lead anyone out of the church. People leave the church all the time, and they have legitimate reasons to leave. There are also legitimate reasons to stay. Thats not my business.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

While she has never been physically threatened by DezNat followers, Hanks says they have directed significant harassment her way.

Theyve spearheaded a letter-writing campaign to my church leaders. Ive been called a false prophet. Theyve made videos and memes of me being a money changer in the temple, Hanks said. Its just ridiculous how much time they spend tearing other people down in the name of Jesus Christ.

Lee says he has pulled away from the DezNat movement in recent months because it has strayed from its original focus.

Its just a hashtag, right? It was a way to connect with people who want to defend the LDS Church, Lee said. Its just been so contaminated by other people who dont defend the church anymore.

Lee has also used the hashtag in a post claiming that teachers should be paid less not more.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

In other replies, Lee argued teachers get amazing benefits, including having summers off, and said they are nearly impossible to fire.

When asked about that post, Lee said his opinion has shifted greatly in the past year.

I dont stand by that. I think teachers need to be paid more, he said. I think administrators get paid way too much.

On the topic of education, Lee complained that LDS Church-run Brigham Young University has drifted to the political left. He responded to a post warning about groups hoping to expose BYU professors for teaching divisive topics with BYU needs to be cleansed.

When the school apologized for a talk by Brad Wilcox, a high-level church leader, Lee replied, BYU is a progressive cesspool now.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

Lee told The Tribune that he was simply complaining that the school, which he did not attend, was drifting from the teachings of the church.

A lot of the professors who are indoctrinating the college students, and who dont go along with what the church espouses, I dont think they have a place at the university, Lee said. I just dont see why they would keep holding on to someone who was actively fighting against what they believe in the church.

A search through the Internet Archive of Lees now-defunct Twitter account showed posts aligned with outrage dominating the conservative zeitgeist at the moment, including election and coronavirus pandemic conspiracies.

There are posts hyping false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. He responded to a Tribune story about Sen. Mike Lees (no known relation to Trevor) efforts to assist Donald Trumps campaign to overturn the election results, and the Utah House candidate asserted there was rampant fraud in many states.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

He has also insulted prominent women for how they looked.

He retweeted a post that called Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan disgusting freaks. In another instance, he called first lady Jill Biden, who was wearing a black-spotted outfit, a dog.

(Screenshot via Twitter) A screenshot from Republican Trevor Lee's now-deleted Twitter account.

As the Republican nominee in the district, Lee is the odds-on favorite to take the House District 16 seat in Novembers election. His only significant opposition is a long-shot, write-in campaign from Steve Handy, whom Lee defeated at the Davis County GOP convention. Handy said Lees social media demonstrates he is out of Utahs political mainstream.

This extreme rhetoric simply does not align with the good people of Davis County and the people I represent in the Legislature, regardless of political party, Handy said in a statement about Lees Twitter account.

(Leah Hogsten | The Salt Lake Tribune) Layton Rep. Steve Handy, who lost his reelection bid to Trevor Lee at the Davis County Republican convention in March, Handy officially announced his campaign surrounded by a crowd of family and supporters in Layton, Aug. 30, 2022. .

Handy has received donations from several current legislators since launching his write-in effort. They include Senate Majority Leader Evan Vickers, R-Cedar City; Sen. Jerry Stevenson, R-Layton; Sen. Don Ipson, R-St. George; Sen. Gregg Buxton, R-Roy; Rep. Merrill Nelson, R-Grantsville; and Rep. Lowry Snow, R-Santa Clara.

Lee has received a handful of donations from lawmakers since winning the nomination, with only one from Sen. John Johnson, R-Ogden coming since Handys write-in announcement.

Schultz, the House GOP leader who criticized Lees online behavior, made a small campaign donation to Lee in May. Schultz says he had no inkling of the posts Lee made with the @ballinlee account when he donated. Lee also received a small donation from the Utah House Republican Election Committee PAC in August, which is afforded to all Republican House candidates once they become the party nominee.

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GOP candidate Trevor Lee ran a secret Twitter account that attacked LGBTQ people and Utah Gov. Cox. Now he's been rebuked by Republican leadership. -...