Mike Lee has in recent years become one of the Senate's most prolific social media posters, his presence seen in thousands of posts, often late at night, about politics. Fellow senators have grown accustomed to the Utah Republican's pugnacious online persona,

Republican Sen. Mike Lee on Tuesday deleted a series of inflammatory social media posts from over the weekend on the deadly attacks in Minnesota, prompting a confrontation with one of the state’s Democratic US senators.

"I wanted him to know how much pain that caused me and the other people in my state," Democratic Sen. Tina Smith said, referring to GOP Sen. Mike Lee.