Sen. Mitt Romney disavowed a Senate hearing held Wednesday by a Republican colleague aimed at legitimizing and propping up Donald Trump’s baseless charges of election fraud.

Sen. Ron Johnson, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, was scheduled Wednesday to lead a hearing called “Examining Irregularities in the 2020 Election.”

Romney, Utah Republican, refused to take part.

“I’m not going to go to that. I don’t think it is productive at this stage. If at some point down the road we want to look at what election irregularities occurred in 2020 as well in 2016 and 2012, sure, but those are marginal irregularities, meaning they’re not substantial and across the board, they are not substantial enough to change outcome of the election,” he said. “It’s always appropriate to find ways to make elections more secure, but our systems have worked pretty well and they have over the years and they will continue to in the future.”

By contrast, Romney praised Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s decision this week to acknowledge Joe Biden as president-elect.

“Well, no, I think Mitch McConnell did exactly what he needs to do. But some of those that are really identified as being strong Trump supporters, they’d make a real difference if they came out and spoke and said you know what, we have to get behind the new president-elect,” Romney said. “He was legitimately elected. Let’s move on.”

And although he has often clashed with the outgoing president, Romney said that he sees Trump continuing to play a political role.

“Well, I think President Trump will continue to have substantial influence on the party and I think if you look at the people rumored to be thinking of running in 2024, besides the president, those are people who are trying to appeal to kind of a populist approach, so I don’t think Trumpism is going away,” Romney said.

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