What happened

Former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) campaigned with Kamala Harris in Ripon, Wisconsin, Thursday as the Democratic presidential nominee ramped up her efforts to win over Republicans and GOP-leaning independents repelled by Donald Trump and his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss. Standing under a "Country Over Party" banner, Cheney said she was "proudly" casting her ballot for Harris, her first time ever voting for a Democratic nominee, because "putting patriotism ahead of partisanship is not an aspiration" this election, "it is our duty."

Who said what

The Harris-Cheney rally in Ripon, a "small city known as the birthplace of the Republican Party in the middle of a battleground state," was an "exercise in unsubtle and unlikely campaign optics," The New York Times said. The two women "agree on little politically beyond their distaste" for Trump and "had next to no relationship" before Cheney decided to endorse Harris last month.

Trump is "petty" and "vindictive" and voters should reject his "depraved cruelty," said Cheney, the No. 3 House Republican, before she jettisoned Trump after the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. "Anyone who recklessly tramples on our democratic values as Donald Trump has" must never be president. Trump called Cheney a "stupid war hawk" yesterday on Fox News, then "reiterated his familiar false claim that he had won the 2020 election" at a Michigan rally "notable mainly for his continued false statements and exaggerations on a number of subjects," the Times said.

What next?

Cheney is "set to continue campaigning against Trump next week," The Washington Post said, joining three former Trump White House aides — Cassidy Hutchinson, who endorsed Harris on Wednesday, Alyssa Farah Griffin and Sarah Matthews — for a rally in the Philadelphia suburbs.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) revealed on Tuesday that the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack is "in discussions" with lawyers representing former President Donald Trump about his testimony before the panel.

The committee issued a subpoena to Trump on Oct. 21, seeking documents by Friday and testimony by Nov. 14. Trump has "an obligation to comply," Cheney, the panel's vice chair, said during an event in Cleveland. The details have not been ironed out, but the testimony will be "done under oath," Cheney continued. "It'll be done, potentially, over multiple days. ... We have significant questions based on the evidence that we've developed and what we know already about the extent to which he was personally and directly involved in every aspect of the effort."

Cheney and the other bipartisan panel members have taken their investigation into the Capitol attack "very seriously," Cheney said. "This is not a situation where the committee is going to put itself at the mercy of Donald Trump in terms of his efforts to create a circus."

Trump has not made any public declarations about turning over documents or providing testimony under oath.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said on Sunday that it doesn't matter if former President Donald Trump testifies before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack live on television or behind closed doors, "He's not going to turn this into a circus."

Cheney, the committee's vice chair, made the remarks during Sunday's Meet the Press. The panel subpoenaed Trump on Friday for both his testimony and documents related to the Capitol riot, giving him until 10 a.m. ET on Nov. 14 to testify at the Capitol or via video conference.

Trump hasn't personally made any public declarations about how he will respond to the subpoena, but people close to him told The New York Times he said he would cooperate if given the opportunity to provide live testimony. When asked if the Jan. 6 panel would approve of Trump testifying live on television, Cheney did not outright reject the idea, saying, "The committee treats this matter with great seriousness. We are going to proceed in terms of the questioning of the former president under oath. It may take multiple days. And it will be done with a level of rigor and discipline and seriousness that it deserves."

Cheney stressed Trump would not have the chance to turn his testimony into "his first debate against Joe Biden," adding, "This is a far too serious set of issues. And we've made clear exactly what his obligations are. And we are proceeding with that set out."

The evidence and testimony gathered by the committee and shown at its nine public hearings shows that Trump committed "multiple criminal offenses," Cheney said, and if Trump ignores the subpoena, the panel has "many, many alternatives" that will allow them to get his testimony and documents.

Veteran journalist Mark Leibovich asked Sen. Lindsey Graham a few years ago why he went from calling candidate Donald Trump "a complete idiot" and a "race-baiting xenophobic bigot" to fawning over the newly elected president on frequent dates on the golf course. "If you know anything about me, it'd be odd not to do this," Graham responded without a trace of shame. It was his nature, the senator explained, "to try to be relevant." This affliction — the need to be relevant, important, on the inside — explains why so many Republicans have feigned admiration for Trump no matter what he says or does. Going to work in the august chambers of Congress has always been heady stuff; the prestige, status, and deference from others that comes with the gig is so intoxicating that many elected officials will do anything to keep their seats — even kneel before an amoral, would-be autocrat. To lose an election over principle, as Liz Cheney did this week, becomes a form of death. Any indignity is preferable to becoming ordinary again. (See Main Stories, p.5.)

By standing up for democracy and her own conscience, Cheney has won far more than she lost. A conservative Republican who'd voted with Trump 93 percent of the time, she denounced him when he tried to overturn an election he decisively lost. After Trump "lit the flame" of the Jan. 6 insurrection, as she put it, Graham and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy briefly joined Cheney in public expressions of disgust. "Count me out," Graham said. "Enough is enough." McCarthy said Trump "bears responsibility." But then Graham and McCarthy saw that Fox News and Trump's base were sticking with him, and they crawled back to smooch his derriere. "Defending the indefensible," is how Cheney described her craven colleagues. When Trump is long gone, she warned them, "your dishonor will remain." Cheney has lost her seat, but not her integrity or her soul.

This is the editor's letter in the current issue of The Week magazine

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) this week lost her Republican primary in a massive landslide, but the staunch critic of former President Donald Trump said her fight for traditional conservative values — and against Trump — was "just beginning." Cheney, who voted to impeach Trump for inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol attack and is now vice chair of the House committee investigating it, said Trump "continues to pose a very grave threat — a risk to our republic." She said on NBC's Today that she would focus now on "doing whatever it takes to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office," possibly by running for president herself.

The Wyoming Republican, once a rising leader of her party, said she would "make a decision in the coming months" about whether to launch a campaign for the White House. Trump has hinted that he's preparing to run in 2024. Cheney hasn't said whether she was thinking about challenging Trump in the Republican primary, or running as an independent. Kyle Kondik, the managing editor of the Crystal Ball political analysis newsletter at the University of Virginia, told USA Today that Cheney would "probably get a very small slice of the vote" and "hurt the Democrats more than the Republicans given her current standing." But GOP consultant Alex Conant told The Wall Street Journal that her "laser focus on Trump and ability to command media attention means she could be a significant factor in 2024." Would Cheney make a difference if she ran for the White House?

Cheney's attacks could weaken Trump

Cheney 2024 could be a first in American politics, says Ronald Brownstein at The Atlantic. "A true kamikaze campaign." Nobody, including Cheney, would expect her to "come anywhere close to winning the GOP nomination behind an anti-Trump message." Only two of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump will be around to "face voters in November" — four retired and four lost their primaries — and Trump-endorsed candidates who "overtly echo his lies" about the 2020 election being stolen from him are winning everywhere. "But many Republicans resistant to Trump believe that Cheney could rally the minority of party voters who continue to express reservations about the former president." She has the name recognition — her father, Dick Cheney, is a former vice president, after all — to mount a serious fundraising campaign, and, as GOP consultant Alex Conant put it, "Every other candidate not named Trump is going to want Liz Cheney on the debate stage." Her "battering-ram attacks" might just weaken Trump enough for someone else to win the GOP nomination.

It would be a risky move

A recent poll showed Cheney in fourth place with 3 percent backing in a GOP primary, behind Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and former Vice President Mike Pence, says Aaron Blake in The Washington Post. A showing like that "could be enough to put Cheney on the debate stage." The party might try to exclude her, but "shutting her out won't be easy" if she's leading other credible candidates. "Imagine Cheney pressing the case against Trump not just in Jan. 6 committee hearings, but also doing it to his face." GOP primary voters seldom hear "counterprogramming on Trump" due to "our siloed conservative media" and the unwillingness of other Republicans to "truly go after Trump," so Cheney's "stop Trump" message might move the needle. But her candidacy could backfire. She could "prove a beneficial foe for Trump — a bogeywoman who exemplifies the kind of weak-kneed Republicans who would dare to align with Democrats, of all people." And if she made a third-party run, hoping to split conservatives, her numbers suggest she'd "appeal more to Democratic-leaning voters than to Republican ones."

Cheney won't stop Trump by running against him

Cheney wants to keep Trump out of the White House. "Fair enough," says Ed Morrissey at Hot Air. But launching her own presidential campaign is her worst option for "pursuing that goal." She doesn't have the national constituency for that. Tuesday's vote showed "she doesn't even have a statewide constituency any longer." About the only followers she has left are in the media, which rallied behind her "as a David against a GOP Goliath." But a "fawning" press corps won't "impress Republican primary voters." An independent run would be doomed to make Evan McMullin's "2016 bid look like an electoral juggernaut." If Cheney really wants to have an impact, she should "simply endorse Republican primary challengers that can defeat Trump in the primaries. There's a real question as to whether a Cheney endorsement would help someone like Ron DeSantis or Glenn Youngkin, to name a couple of potential challengers, but they're more likely to 'stop' Trump by beating him to the nomination than a Liz Cheney challenge."

Democrats need to get over their infatuation with Cheney

Cheney deserves praise for her "courage in standing up to Trump," says Celia Viggo Wexler at NBCNews.com. Her "star power" has been crucial for the Jan. 6 hearings. "She's been that rara avis, a Republican lawmaker with both a conscience and a backbone — solemnly warning her cowardly colleagues: 'There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain.'" But Democrats who have become infatuated with her should remember her record in three terms in Congress has matched Trump's positions 93 percent of the time. Cheney opposed the Violence Against Women Act, the Affordable Care Act — "voting for Trump's plan to dismantle it" — and is a "hardliner on immigration." She's "Trump without the lying, bullying, and immorality." Remember, Cheney backed Trump in 2016, and was a latecomer "to the anti-Trump party." Kudos to Cheney for defending the Constitution and trying to reform the GOP. "By all means, give the woman the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Just don't give her the keys to the White House."

As was expected, vulnerable Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) lost her bid for re-election on Tuesday night, having conceded to former President Donald Trump-backed challenger attorney Harriet Hageman. Cheney, who handily won the GOP primary just two years ago, noted in post-election remarks that winning again "would have required I go along with President Trump's lie about the 2020 election" — "a path I could not and would not take." Despite the congressional ouster, however, don't expect Cheney to disappear from view just yet (for one thing, she's already confirmed she's mulling a 2024 presidential bid). Below, pundits and thought leaders tackle the Wyoming Republican's long-projected loss, as well as its present significance and implications for the future.

Her defeat proves the Republican party still belongs to Trump

With Cheney gone, just two of the 10 House Republicans who voted for Trump's second impeachment could return to Congress next year; four are retiring, and four others (Cheney included) lost their re-election bid to a Trump-backed challenger.

Ultimately, such a "wholesale ejection" of "anti-Trump forces is evidence that the Republican Party still belongs to the former president," even two years after he left office, Seth Moskowitz argues for Newsweek. And Unless the GOP learns from members like Cheney, as well as Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.) — who Moskowitz describes as maintaining an excellent "balancing act on nearly all Trump-related issues" — "the Republican Party will continue relentlessly down the path it took Tuesday with Cheney: ejecting anti-Trump Republicans one by one until there is no internal resistance to the former president whatsoever."

Both she and her focus aren't going anywhere

At least on the national stage, expect former Rep. Liz Cheney to stick around — in perhaps both the media and political world, opinion columnist Joe Concha mused for The Hill. But we'll see whether she readjusts her messaging to take aim at any of America's other major problems (like inflation, abortion, climate), or if she stays in her simple, and relatively unhelpful, lane of sure-to-be continued rebukes of Donald Trump. Concha estimates more of the latter: "It is not difficult to see a scenario in which Cheney is either on cable news multiple times per day talking about the dangers of Donald Trump or running a presidential campaign, one based not on fixing the country's multiple crises … but solely on Trump," Concha writes. At the very least, "both paths" suggest America should be prepared to see more of what they've already seen this summer: "Liz Cheney. Lots of Liz Cheney. And the subject she'll mostly be talking about: Donald Trump. Lots of Donald Trump."

We need more like her

Cheney, an "antiabortion foreign policy hawk" who voted with Trump "93 percent of the time," never "surrendered her status as a card-carrying conservative," posited The Washington Post Editorial Board — and that's not why she lost to Hageman. She was defeated because she "refused to bow" to the former president, and also recognized — unlike those in House Republican leadership — "that ideology and party loyalty should not matter when facing a fundamental threat to democracy." Going forward, especially as politicians "spew reckless rhetoric" regarding the U.S. electoral system, "the country needs … more Liz Cheneys" in power, "regardless of their positions on tax hikes or deregulation or free trade," the board continues. "Now, it will have one less."

Writing for The Boston Globe, columnist Scot Lehigh issued a similar take: Cheney "should have been the ideal conservative messenger" in the fight against Trump; Instead, her loss proves that "for a significant subset of America, demagoguery trumps truth."

'Traditional Republicans' are not lost

Despite what Cheney's defeat suggests, the "old guard" of the American right is still kicking, Stephanie Muravchik and Jon Shields, authors of a forthcoming book about Cheney and the GOP, argue in The New York Times. Though the "identitarians" of the present party — "consumed with demonstrating that they are authentic conservative Republicans," and, in that sense, "succumbing to the same impulses they associate with their liberal opponents'' — keep "gaining momentum," results still matter. And fortunately, the GOP establishment "isn't dead, even in Wyoming. In fact, it's far more entrenched than Ms. Cheney's defeat might suggest," the pair write.

Cheney ultimately "fought valiantly" for her party and was "celebrated by traditional Republicans" for doing so. "They don't believe her cause is lost," Muravchik and Shields conclude: "and neither should we."

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) has lost her Republican primary race to Harriet Hageman, several news outlets are projecting.

Cheney was one of the few Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump in the wake of the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, and is the vice chair of the House select committee investigating the incident. Hageman, a lawyer, had Trump's backing, though her support of the former president is a reversal from her 2016 stance, when she called him "the weakest candidate" in the GOP presidential race and tried to undermine his nomination at the Republican National Convention.

Cheney addressed supporters Tuesday night in Jackson, Wyoming, and said that she called Hageman and conceded the race. "The primary is over, now the real work begins," Cheney declared.

Cheney recounted that a Gold Star father once told her that "standing up for truth honors all who gave all," and she has "thought of his words every single day since then." Two years ago, Cheney won the GOP primary with 73 percent of the vote, "and I could easily have done the same again," she said. "The path was clear, but it would have required I go along with President Trump's lie about the 2020 election. It would have required that I enable his ongoing efforts to unravel our democratic system and attack the foundations of our republic. That was a path I could not and would not take."

Cheney went on to say that "no House seat, no office in this land is more important than the principles we are all sworn to protect, and I well understood the political consequences of abiding by our duty." She reiterated her pledge to "do whatever it takes to ensure Donald Trump is never again anywhere near the Oval Office, and I mean this."

"I'm a conservative Republican," Cheney said. "I believe deeply in the principles and ideals on which my party was founded. I love its history and I love what it stood for. But I love my country more. So I ask you tonight to join me as we leave here, let us resolve that we will stand together — Republicans, Democrats, and independents — against those who would destroy our republic. They are angry, they are determined, but they have not seen anything like the power of Americans united in defense of our Constitution and committed to the cause of freedom. There is no greater power on this Earth, and with God's help, we will prevail."

The day has finally come: On Tuesday, GOP lawmakers Rep. Liz Cheney and Sen. Lisa Murkowski — both congressional targets of former President Donald Trump — will face the political music as voters in their respective states of Wyoming and Alaska head to the polls.

Cheney, who has been all but excommunicated from her party over her criticism of Trump and her work on the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, is widely expected to lose her seat following a challenge from Trump-backed candidate Harriet Hageman.

And in Alaska, the more-moderate Lisa Murkowski, who The New York Times notes "was one of seven Republicans to vote to convict [Trump] of incitement of insurrection," will attempt to fend off former state official Kelly Tshibaka, who, like Hageman, boasts backing from the former president.

But that's not the state's only marquee race — former Gov. Sarah Palin (R) is also trying for a political comeback, this time "in the open race for the state's sole seat in Congress, last held by Don Young, who died in March," the Times writes. Palin is angling to win a special election runoff to finish out the remainder of Young's term, as well as a primary to serve a full two-year cycle of her own.

Notably, due to a recent change in state election law, both Palin and Murkowski need only be among the top four finishers in their respective primaries to advance to the general election in November, adds The Associated Press.

On Tuesday, third-term Rep. Liz Cheney will face off in the GOP primary for Wyoming's lone seat in the House of Representatives against a Trump-endorsed challenger, Harriet Hageman. Last year, Cheney was stripped of her leadership role in the party for prominently supporting former President Donald Trump's impeachment, and she has played a lead role in conducting the House inquiry into the Jan. 6 insurrection. Why are there growing whispers that she could run for the presidency in 2024? Here's everything you need to know about Cheney's political future:

Can Cheney hang on in Wyoming?

Since she voted to impeach former President Trump in 2021, Cheney has faced an uphill re-election battle in her home state of Wyoming. Despite her family's status as mainstream Republican royalty — her father Dick Cheney served eight years as the vice president from 2001 to 2009 — Cheney's position in the GOP has steadily deteriorated. Her opponent, Harriet Hageman, a conservative lawyer and critic of federal environmental and land use policies in Wyoming, has called the 2020 election "rigged," touts far-right activist Dinesh D'Souza's conspiracy-promoting film 2000 Mules and has assailed the Jan. 6 Committee as "illegitimate from its inception." Staking out those positions has allowed her to open up a large polling lead over Cheney in a state that Donald Trump carried in 2020 by more than 43 points.

Anything can happen on election day, especially in an August primary in a state where Republicans rule virtually uncontested. But Cheney looks like she is almost certainly headed to defeat, despite outspending Hageman and even enlisting her elderly father to cut a campaign ad attacking Trump. Her decision to stand on principle vis-a-vis Trump and Trumpism is likely to cost her the GOP nomination for Wyoming and to effectively end her career in Republican politics. It's a fate that nearly every elected Republican who voted for impeachment and ran for re-election has faced, and she surely priced in that risk when she made her decisions in the first place. But she doesn't talk or act like former Sen. Jeff Flake, a Trump critic whose electoral ambitions disappeared with him when he retired from the Senate rather than trying to win a primary in 2018. And that has fueled speculation that she might challenge Trump for the presidency.

Why would Cheney run?

If she were to run, would she do so as a Republican, or as an independent? Navigating the GOP primaries in a party that is now thoroughly under the former president's thumb seems like a pure suicide run. If the party employs polling metrics to determine who gets on the debate stage (assuming there are debates at all), Cheney might not even make the cut. It's also not hard to see Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel simply deciding to exclude Cheney on principle. And a run that peters out after ruinous finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire doesn't seem worth the effort. That means that Cheney might attempt to pursue a third-party or independent run for the office, a path that doesn't make capturing the presidency all that more likely — no candidate outside of the two-party system of their time has ever won the presidency — but which could undermine Trump's path to restoration (assuming he isn't in jail for violations of the Espionage Act or barred from pursuing office for other reasons) more difficult.

Cheney is on record as wanting to rescue the GOP from the forces of Trumpism. If she is crushed as expected on Tuesday in Wyoming, she will likely conclude that this must be done outside the institutional apparatus controlled by Trump and his acolytes. And almost no one will spend the time, energy, and resources mounting a serious bid for the presidency if they really don't think they could win. Cheney, therefore, must hope to draw votes not just from Trump or the GOP nominee in 2024, but also from conservative Democrats enthralled by her performance on the Jan. 6 committee hearings. Her star turn as insurrection inquisitor could give her some cache with congressional Democrats like Rep. Mikie Sherrill (N.J.) and Rep. Elissa Slotkin (Mich.), who Cheney recently said she would "rather work with" than many of the MAGA supporters on her own team. Perhaps a few could be convinced to support her rather than the Democratic nominee.

But Cheney is no dreamer, and she probably knows she can't win that way. If that's the case, she may see her role as a spoiler who could drain just enough votes from Trump or the GOP nominee to be the difference-maker for Democrats. Even then, though, the calculus is not simple. While Republicans typically blame Ross Perot for siphoning votes from incumbent President George H.W. Bush in 1992, allowing Democrat Bill Clinton to win with a plurality, some scholars maintain that Perot's candidacy hurt Clinton. And third party candidates often attract voters who would otherwise abstain from voting altogether, complicating straightforward cause-and-effect narratives.

Will Cheney run?

The allure of national fame that comes along with a presidential bid is difficult to resist. Dick Cheney himself has said that his daughter will "lead the effort to make sure Donald Trump is never again near the Oval Office." She refused to rule out a 2024 run in an interview with CNN's Kasie Hunt. Ultimately, serious preparations for a bid are difficult to hide from the media and the general public. And if it looks like Trump is likely to be the nominee for the GOP, it would be foolish to assume that Cheney will sit on the sidelines. What exactly she'll be doing on the playing field, however, is anyone's guess.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), who is facing an uphill battle to win the Republican nomination in Wyoming's Aug. 16 primary, released an ad Thursday focused on the issue that may keep her from being re-elected: Former President Donald Trump. In the ad, her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, looks at the camera and calls the last Republican president "a coward" and one of the greatest threats to democracy the U.S. has ever faced. Liz Cheney has made similar points as vice-chair of the House Jan. 6 committee.

"In our nation's 246-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump," Dick Cheney says in the ad. "He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him." Trump "is a coward," Cheney adds. "A real man wouldn't lie to his supporters. He lost his election, and he lost big. I know it, he knows it, and deep down I think most Republicans know it."

Wyoming Republicans are likely to replace Liz Cheney with her Trump-backed GOP challenger, Harriet Hageman, who led Cheney by 22 percentage points in a Casper Star-Tribune poll released in July. "I don't expect to lose," Cheney told CNN's Kasey Hunt in an interview broadcast Thursday night. "I'm working hard to earn every single vote and ultimately, I really believe that the people of Wyoming fundamentally understand how important fidelity to the Constitution is." Along with her father, Cheney has touted the backing of former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.) and actor Kevin Costner.

Cheney also told Hunt she thinks Trump is "guilty of the most serious dereliction of duty of any president in our nation's history," adding that a federal judge found it more likely than not that Trump committed two crimes. But the Justice Department will "have to make decisions about prosecution," she noted, "understanding what it means if the facts and the evidence are there, and they decide not to prosecute. How do we then call ourselves a nation of laws?"

The Jan. 6 committee may make criminal referrals, Cheney told CNN, but "the question for us is: Are we a nation of laws? Are we a country where no one is above the law? And what do the facts and the evidence show?"

A new Casper Star-Tribune poll shows Rep. Liz Cheney, a Republican leader on the Jan. 6 committee, far behind her challenger, Harriet Hageman, in the House GOP primary for Wyoming's U.S. House seat. Hageman had the backing of 52 percent of participants, to Cheney's 30 percent. The poll, conducted for the Star-Tribune by Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy, is the first independent, in-state poll on the race. It was taken from July 7 to July 11, just after the start of early voting. There's no way for Cheney supporters to sugarcoat the results, according to Brad Coker, Mason-Dixon managing director. "The big story is Liz Cheney is going to get beat," said Coker. "That's a foregone conclusion."

Cheney fell out of favor with Wyoming's Republican establishment, which censured her after she voted in favor of then-President Donald Trump's impeachment over the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack by a mob of his supporters. Cheney kept pushing as a leader of the House select committee investigating the attack, and Trump's role in encouraging the rioters by urging them to pressure Congress not to certify his 2020 election loss to President Biden. Trump has endorsed Hageman, a natural resources lawyer, and called Cheney "despicable." Cheney has outspent her primary opponents with ads touting her unwavering conservative record — she voted with Trump 92.9 percent of the time. Has Cheney's continuing criticism of Trump, and her rejection of his baseless claims of election fraud doomed her career in Congress?

Cheney is indeed 'toast'

Cheney really appears to be "toast," says Byron York in the Washington Examiner. That comes as no surprise, given her insistence that Trump is unfit for office. "Cheney's Ahab-like fixation on getting Trump is unpopular in a state where so many voters have a favorable view of the former president." But Cheney's problems started before Trump entered the picture. Cheney, daughter of former vice president and Wyoming congressman Dick Cheney, was born in Wisconsin and grew up in Washington, D.C. Her detractors accuse her of returning to her family's home state "only to win political office." Falling out of sync with Wyoming Republicans on Trump only reinforced criticism of her as an "opportunistic outsider," and "reminded some Wyomingites of everything they didn't like about" her in the first place.

Cheney's problem isn't that she's an outsider

The MAGA crowd isn't mad at Liz Cheney because they think she's a carpetbagger, says Jonah Goldberg at The Dispatch. She's "a villain because she's telling the truth." Trump's diehard supporters "passionately believe the election was stolen" — even though there is zero evidence it was — because they have chosen to believe the lie. The argument for how the presidency was stolen from Trump "evolves as each specific claim gets debunked... The Italians did it! No wait, it was Hugo Chavez! Okay, Chavez didn't do it — it was the Chinese! Okay, I was wrong about the Chinese, it was Dominion! No, it was Mark Zuckerberg. The Deep State! Soros! Fauci! Col. Sanders..." When that's the reasoning you're up against, being on the side of truth puts you on the losing team.

Unlikely allies could give Cheney a shot

This brutal poll is a "tribute to Cheney's courage in standing up against Donald Trump in a state where the election-denying prevaricator won 70 percent of the vote in 2020," says E.J. Dionne Jr. in The Washington Post. Cheney's last hope is for "every Democrat" and independent in Wyoming to cross over and vote for her in the Aug. 16 Republican primary, "which they can do under state law." Cheney always knew "her eloquent leading role" in the Jan. 6 committee's hearings would "hurt her with the party faithful back home." That's why Democrats and independents "who understand the threat of Trumpism should flood into Wyoming's Republican primary." Even if it's not enough to "sustain Cheney, they would send a message for November: that the threat to democracy is the most important issue on the ballot. Standing with democracy's defenders, even if you disagree with them on many other issues, should take priority."

Losing this primary won't end Cheney's political career

Cheney's campaign ads don't even mention Trump, says John Nichols in The Nation. They "talk about her fierce opposition to gun control, abortion rights, and 'Green New Deal regulations [that] threaten to hamstring our producers and stifle economic growth in our communities.'" But Trump is sure campaigning against her through Hageman, who is "mounting an overtly pro-Trump and anti-Cheney campaign." If Hageman and the others in the field split the pro-Trump vote, Cheney has a shot. But even if she loses, and Trump wins, "Cheney still has ambitions within a Republican Party that she imagines — like many pundits — will eventually move beyond Trump and Trumpism." In the Jan. 6 committee's first hearing, Cheney scolded GOP colleagues who have backpedaled from blaming Trump for fueling the Jan. 6 riot with his election lies, saying: "There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain." When that day comes, conservatives might see Cheney differently.

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack is considering subpoenaing Virginia "Ginni" Thomas if she doesn't agree to sit for a voluntary interview, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said Sunday.

On Sunday's State of the Union, Cheney said Thomas' attorney is still "engaged" with the committee, but the panel is "fully prepared to contemplate a subpoena" if she won't make a voluntarily appearance. "I hope it doesn't get to that," Cheney added.

Thomas, a conservative activist, is the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. The Jan. 6 committee has obtained texts Thomas sent to former President Donald Trump's chief of staff Mark Meadows after the 2020 election, urging him to do what he could to overturn the results.

Cheney also revealed that the committee has not yet decided whether to make criminal referrals to the Department of Justice, calling this something the panel takes "very seriously." She believes that "Donald Trump, the violation of his oath of office, the violation of the Constitution that he engaged in, is the most serious misconduct of any president in the history of our nation." She added that there is "no doubt" in her mind that Trump "is unfit for further office."

At the conclusion of Thursday night's Jan. 6 committee hearing, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) praised the witnesses who have come forward to testify, noting that many are lifelong Republicans who had been proud to work with former President Donald Trump in his White House.

"The case against Donald Trump in these hearings is not made by witnesses who were his political enemies," Cheney, the vice-chair of the panel, said. "It is instead a series of confessions by Donald Trump's own appointees, his own friends, his own campaign officials, people who worked for him for years, and his own family. They have come forward and they have told the American people the truth."

Sarah Matthews, Trump's deputy White House press secretary, and Matthew Pottinger, a former National Security Council official, both testified in person on Thursday night. Cheney thanked them, as well as Cassidy Hutchinson, the former aide to Trump's final chief of staff Mark Meadows, who testified during an earlier hearing that Trump was fine with his armed supporters marching on the Capitol.

Hutchinson, Cheney said, "knew all along that she would be attacked by President Trump and by the 50-, 60-, and 70-year-old men who hide themselves behind executive privilege. But like our witnesses today, she has courage and she did it anyway."

Cheney also played a newly-released 2020 recording of Stephen Bannon, a former Trump adviser, saying that if Trump was behind in the vote tally on election night, he would claim that the election was stolen. "What the new Steve Bannon audio demonstrates is that Donald Trump's plan to falsely claim victory in 2020, no matter what the facts actually were, was premeditated," Cheney said. "Here's the worst part. Donald Trump knew that millions of Americans who supported him would stand up and defend our nation. Were it threatened, they would put their lives and their freedom at stake to protect her. And he is preying on their patriotism. He is preying on their sense of justice. And on Jan. 6, Donald Trump turned their love of country into a weapon against our Capitol and our Constitution."

At the conclusion of Tuesday's Jan. 6 committee hearing, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) revealed that former President Donald Trump attempted to contact a witness in the panel's investigation.

"After our last hearing, President Trump tried to call a witness in our investigation, a witness you have not yet seen in these hearings," Cheney, the vice chair of the committee, said. "That person declined to answer or respond to President Trump's call, and instead alerted their lawyer to the call. Their lawyer alerted us. And this committee has supplied that information to the Department of Justice."

Last week, the panel shared that a Trump ally reached out to a witness and said Trump was monitoring the hearings and reading transcripts. The committee, Cheney said on Tuesday, will "take any effort to influence witness testimony very seriously."

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) believes "the majority of Republicans across the country" understand the importance of protecting and defending the Constitution, she said Sunday — and then there's House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).

Cheney, vice chair of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, told CBS Sunday Morning there are "too many people now in the Republican Party who are not taking their responsibilities seriously, and who have pledged their allegiance and loyalty to [former President] Donald Trump." This, she added, is "fundamentally antithetical, it is contrary to everything conservatives believe, to embrace a personality cult."

Because of her public criticism of Trump, Cheney was voted out of Republican leadership last year, and McCarthy was angry when she joined the Jan. 6 committee. He has ignored a subpoena issued by the panel, and when asked if she thinks McCarthy is afraid of Trump, Cheney told CBS "I think some of it is fear. I think it's also craven political calculation. I think that he has decided that, you know, the most important thing to him is to attempt to be speaker of the House. And therefore he is embracing those in our party who are antisemitic; he is embracing those in our party who are white nationalists; he is lying about what happened on Jan. 6; and he's turned his back on the Constitution."

The Jan. 6 committee is holding its first public hearing since July on Thursday, and Cheney said she is confident Americans will realize that the insurrection is "an ongoing threat." Trump hasn't shown any remorse for what happened on Jan. 6, Cheney added, and "we are in fact in a situation where he continues to use even more extreme language, frankly, than the language that caused the attack. And so, people must pay attention. People must watch, and they must understand how easily our democratic system can unravel if we don't defend it."

Former President Donald Trump held a rally in Wyoming on Saturday to boost attorney Harriet Hageman, who is challenging anti-Trump Rep. Liz Cheney in August's Republican primary, Rolling Stone and Fox News reported.

Trump said that Cheney, one of two Republicans serving on the committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, has "gone crazy." Trump also denounced Cheney and her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, as "warmongers" and "diehard globalists" who "have been plunging us into new conflicts for decades."

Hageman spoke before Trump, warning that Democratic policies could "turn the greatest country on Earth into a third-world failure" and accusing the Jan. 6 commission of trying to "gaslight" conservatives.

Recent data suggest Cheney's chances of re-election are slim. According to Politico, polling conducted by the Club for Growth, which opposes Cheney, showed Hageman "garnering 56 percent of the vote to Cheney's 26 percent."

The poll was conducted on May 24 and 25, surveyed 400 likely GOP primary voters, and has an error margin of 4.9 percent.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) on Monday urged House GOP leadership to "renounce and reject" white supremacy in remarks that followed a racially-motivated shooting in Buffalo, New York this weekend.

In a tweet, Cheney said that House Republican leadership has "enabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and antisemitism," and that "history has taught us that what begins with words ends in far worse." Her message quickly racked up thousands of retweets and replies.

Cheney, who is currently facing a primary challenge from attorney Harriet Hageman, has emerged as a vocal critic of both former President Donald Trump and her party, which subsequently ousted her from House leadership last year. Notably, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) — Cheney's replacement in leadership — came under fire this weekend for having allegedly echoed the racist "great replacement" theory believed to have motivated the Buffalo gunman. Stefanik has since condemned the reports as "dangerous media smears."

On Monday, several liberal commentators and lawmakers welcomed Cheney's message.

Of course, not everyone felt the same way.

Ten people were killed and three were injured after a gunman opened fire at a Buffalo grocery store on Saturday. The shooter had previously described himself as a white supremacist. He surrendered after the attack and has since been charged with first-degree murder. The mass shooting was just one of many this weekend.

The John F. Kennedy Library Foundation will, for the first time ever, honor 5 individuals with the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award this year, including Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, The Washington Post reports.

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D), Arizona House Speaker Russell "Rusty" Bowers (R), and Wandrea "Shaye" Moss, who works for the Fulton Country election department in Georgia, will also receive the award.

"These honorees have placed their careers and lives on the line to protect democratic principles and free and fair elections," the foundation said. "They embody what President Kennedy admired most in others — political courage."

The group applauded Zelensky's "principled leadership," which has "strengthened the resolve of Ukrainians and people around the globe to protect and defend the fragile human right of self-determination." Ukraine is currently fending off an unprompted invasion at the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The foundation also praised Cheney, a vocal critic of former President Donald Trump and member of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, for refusing "to take the politically expedient course that most of her party embraced."

Cheney has repeatedly spoken out against the former president and his grip on the GOP, even at the expense of her political standing among colleagues. A Trump-backed challenger is running against her in Wyoming's upcoming Republican primary.

In a statement, Cheney said she was "grateful" for the "tremendous honor" of the Profile in Courage Award, and called on Americans to help defend democracy.

"If we do not stand for truth, the rule of law, and our Constitution," Cheney said, "if we set aside our founding principles for the politics of the moment, the miracle of our constitutional republic will slip away."

The Liz Cheney campaign is holding on quite well, it seems.

As she fends off challenger Harriet Hageman (an attorney who's backed by former President Donald Trump), the Wyoming Republican has actually broken yet another personal fundraising record, having brought in an impressive $2.94 million in the first quarter of 2022, Politico reports Monday.

Cheney, who was ousted from House leadership last year after speaking out against Trump and his role in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, shattered her record from Q4 of 2021, in which she raised $2 million.

With 2022's Q1 total in mind, Cheney's "total haul" for the cycle comes to over $10 million; with four months left in her primary campaign, she has $6.8 million at her disposal, per Politico.

Hageman herself has plenty of high-profile GOP backing aside from Trump — House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, billionaire and activist Peter Thiel, and dozens of House Republicans have pledged their support for the newcomer. But Cheney counts former President George W. Bush, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R), Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), and former House Speaker Paul Ryan among her ranks, and her first-quarter fundraising total clocks in at "more than double what Hageman raised last quarter," Politico writes.

With another "Trumpy" Republican candidate Anthony Bouchard still in the Wyoming race, perhaps Hageman and Bouchard will ultimately split the Trump vote, allowing Cheney to "squeak by with a plurality coalition of traditional Republicans and Democrats who switch parties to vote for her on primary day," Politico notes.

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack voted unanimously on Monday night to recommend Peter Navarro and Dan Scavino be referred to the Department of Justice for criminal contempt of Congress charges.

During the Trump administration, Navarro served as a trade adviser and Scavino was White House deputy chief of staff. Both have refused to cooperate with the Jan. 6 committee, ignoring subpoenas for their testimonies and documents related to the Capitol riot.

On Sunday night, the committee issued a report stating that Navarro and Scavino have both claimed that because of "executive privilege," they don't have to cooperate with the panel. President Biden has already waived executive privilege in relation to the investigation.

In January, Navarro appeared on MSNBC and admitted to host Ari Melber that he concocted a plan called the "Green Bay Sweep" with Stephen Bannon, former President Donald Trump's onetime chief strategist. It was a way to overturn Biden's electoral victory, and Navarro explained that more than 100 members of Congress were prepared to participate, challenging the results in "six battleground states." He said the plan was launched "beautifully" by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), but thwarted by the pro-Trump mob storming the Capitol. Navarro has said that Trump "was on board with the strategy."

The committee's report also stated that Scavino "reportedly attended several meetings" with Trump "in which challenges to the election were discussed," and was part of a campaign to spread false information on social media about "alleged election fraud and recruiting a crowd to Washington for the events of January 6th."

The panel previously voted on criminal referrals for Bannon and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, after they both ignored subpoenas from the committee. The Justice Department has not yet acted on the referral against Meadows, but Bannon has been charged with two counts of contempt. He pleaded not guilty, and his trial is expected to begin in July.

New information about the Jan. 6 Capitol riot will be revealed in the near future, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), vice chair of the House select committee investigating the attack, said on Sunday.

During an appearance on Meet the Press, Cheney said the committee's "first priority" is to make recommendations about legislation and criminal penalties for officials who do not carry out their duties.

"We're looking at things like do we need additional enhanced criminal penalties for the kind of supreme dereliction of duty that you saw with President Trump when he refused to tell the mob to go home after he had provoked that attack on the Capitol," Cheney said. "So there will be legislative recommendations, and there certainly will be new information."

The panel has interviewed dozens of witnesses, and public hearings are expected to start in the spring. "I have not learned a single thing since I have been on this committee that has made me less concerned or less worried about the gravity of the situation and the actions that President Trump took and also refused to take when the attack was underway," Cheney said.

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) had some harsh words for Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), and any other Republicans who attend white nationalist events and support Russian President Vladimir Putin amid the invasion of Ukraine.

Greene and Gosar both participated in the America First Political Action Conference Friday in Orlando, with Greene speaking in person and Gosar appearing in taped remarks, CNN reports. The conference was organized by white nationalist Nick Fuentes. During an interview Sunday on CNN's State of the Union, Romney said there is "no place in either political party for this white nationalism or racism. It's simply wrong ... it's evil as well."

As for Greene and Gosar specifically, "I don't know them, but I'm reminded of that old line from the Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid movie where one character says, 'Morons, I've got morons on my team,'" Romney said. "And I have to think anybody that would sit down with white nationalists and speak at their conference was certainly missing a few IQ points."

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) tweeted a video on Saturday of Fuentes introducing Greene at the event and calling on the crow to "give a round of applause for Russia." Cheney wrote, "As Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Rep. Paul Gosar speak at this white supremacist, anti-Semitic, pro-Putin event, silence by Republican Party leaders is deafening and enabling. All Americans should renounce this garbage and reject the Putin wing of the GOP now."

Romney told CNN that Putin has been "an adversary of America at every chance he's had," and hearing Republican say they support him is "unthinkable to me, it's almost treasonous and it just makes me ill to see some of these people do that. But, of course, they do it because if they get shock value and it's good to get more eyeballs and maybe make a little more money for them or their network. It's disgusting."

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has officially endorsed attorney Harriet Hageman, the top challenger to incumbent GOP Rep. Liz Cheney, in the race for Wyoming's one and only House seat, The Federalist reports Thursday.

"After spending time with Harriet, it is readily apparent she will always listen and prioritize the needs of her local communities and is focused on tackling our nation's biggest problems," McCarthy told the Federalist. "I look forward to serving with Harriet for years to come."

In backing Hageman (who also has the support of notable Cheney-hater former President Donald Trump), McCarthy is not only taking his denouncement of the Wyoming lawmaker to the next level, he's breaking with typical party protocol, CNN notes, given "GOP leaders in the House have long had a posture of neutrality in primaries."

Cheney has been quite viciously alienated from her party, for both her service on the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and her vocal criticism of Trump. In May, for instance, she was ousted from her House leadership position. And earlier this month, the Republican National Committee voted to formally censure both her and fellow GOP Trump-critic-turned-Jan. 6-committee-member Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois for their work in investigating the riot.

With McCarthy's support of Hageman now out in the open, "other members of the GOP conference" can "openly support Cheney's primary challenger with the blessing of leadership," the Federalist writes.

An official statement should come from Team McCarthy around 6 p.m. per Bloomberg News' Billy House.

Jan. 6 committee member and Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney on Thursday released an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, assuring those who criticize the panel's Capitol riot investigation that their taunts and threats go in one ear and out the other.

Titled "The Jan. 6 Committee Won't Be Intimated," the op-ed begins with Cheney recounting the oath her great-great-grandfather made when he re-enlisted in the Union Army in 1863, the same oath that's been made by generations of Americans since — the promise to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic."

Cheney then addressed former President Donald Trump's latest claims that former Vice President Mike Pence could have and should have overturned the results of the 2020 election.

"What Mr. Trump had insisted that Mr. Pence do on Jan. 6 was not only un-American, it was unconstitutional and illegal," Cheney wrote.

Finally, the representative turned her attention to the select committee investigating the Capitol riot, and its determination in getting to the bottom of what happened that day.

"Those who do not wish the truth of Jan. 6 to come out have predictably resorted to attacking the process — claiming it is tainted and political," Cheney said. "We are focused on facts, not rhetoric, and we will present those facts without exaggeration, no matter what criticism we face."

She concluded: "Every generation of Americans has fulfilled its duty to support and defend the Constitution. That responsibility now falls to us." Read the full op-ed at The Wall Street Journal.

Following the passage of a draft resolution on Thursday night, the Republican National Committee on Friday voted to formally censure GOP Reps. Liz Cheney (Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (Ill.) for their participation on the Jan. 6 committee investigating the Capitol riot, CNN confirmed.

What's more, it sounds like the official vote wasn't a drawn-out affair. According to The Washington Post's Josh Dawsey, the whole process took just about a minute, and the resolution was not read or presented. There was no debate or discussion, either, he added.

Both Cheney and Kinzinger have drawn ire from fellow Republican lawmakers for their repeated criticism of former President Donald Trump. Both of them also voted to impeach Trump for his role in the insurrection, the Post notes.

Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) ain't talkin'.

When asked about the Republican National Committee's resolution to censure Jan. 6 committee members and vocal critics of former President Donald Trump Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), the House minority leader seemingly opted to stay quiet and not say anything at all.

Even after multiple requests for comment, McCarthy refused to talk. The reporters in the exchange were ABC's Mariam Khan and CNN's Daniella Micaela, per ABC's Jonathan Karl.

Both Cheney and Kinzinger have, in many ways, broken with their party as of late, including in their accepting House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-Calif.) invitation to serve on the committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. Kinzinger, who will not run for re-election, was also one of 10 Republicans who voted to impeach Trump for his role in the insurrection, as was Cheney.

Furthermore, the Wyoming Republican was ousted from her House leadership position last year for her criticism of the former president.

Not long after the reporters' attempt at conversation with McCarthy, the RNC voted to formally censure both Cheney and Kinzinger.

The Republican National Committee will consider a resolution on Friday to censure two of the party's most vocal critics of former President Donald Trump: Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.).

Cheney and Kinzinger are also the only Republicans on the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. RNC member and resolution co-sponsor Harmeet Dhillon told CBS News the resolution was passed by committee on Thursday afternoon, and the full vote will take place during Friday's RNC meeting in Salt Lake City.

"I think it's important for members of the Republican Party to support one another and [Cheney and Kinzinger] made it clear over the past year that it's more important for them to attack the former president than it is to support the principles of the Republican Party," resolution co-sponsor John Wahl, chairman of the Alabama Republican Party, told CBS News.

An earlier version of the resolution called for House Republicans to expel Cheney and Kinzinger from the party's conference, CBS News reports, but was changed to censure after more RNC members gave their input. Bill Palatucci, an RNC member from New Jersey, told CBS News the resolution is "distracting and counterproductive for our effort to win in November. I'm glad that it was revised several times and watered down to just censure."

Kinzinger, who announced last year that he will not seek re-election in November, stated on Thursday that he has "no regrets about my decision to uphold my oath of office and defend the Constitution." Cheney said she is "a constitutional conservative and I do not recognize those in my party who have abandoned the Constitution to embrace Donald Trump. History will be their judge. I will never stop fighting for our constitutional republic. No matter what."

The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection has "interviewed more than 300 witnesses, collected tens of thousands of documents, and traveled around the country to talk to election officials who were pressured by Donald Trump," The Associated Press reports. Now, the committee "is preparing to go public," with several televised hearings, an interim report in the spring, and a final report in the fall.

"Let me say that what we have been able to ascertain is that we came perilously close to losing our democracy," Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) told CNN on Sunday.

"The full picture is coming to light, despite President Trump's ongoing efforts to hide the picture," committee Vice-Chairwoman Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), told AP. "I don't think there's any area of this broader history in which we aren't learning new things."

Among those new things, Cheney told ABC News on Sunday, is what Trump himself was — and was not — doing during the insurrection. "The committee has firsthand testimony now that he was sitting in the dining room next to the Oval Office watching the attack on television," and as he was sitting there, "members of his staff were pleading with him to go on television to tell people to stop," she said. "We have firsthand testimony that his daughter Ivanka went in at least twice to ask him to please stop this violence."

At any time, Trump could have gone on TV and his rioting supporters "to go home – and he failed to do so," Cheney said. "It's hard to imagine a more significant and more serious dereliction of duty than that."

Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), the other Republican on the nine-member committee, told AP that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) "made an epic mistake" by refusing to appoint any members to the committee after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) rejected two of his nominees. "I think part of the reason we've gone so fast and have been so effective so far is because we've decided and we have the ability to do this as a nonpartisan investigation," and it would have been "a very different scene" if Trump allies were on the committee, obstructing their work.

Politico's Kyle Cheney made a similar case in late December, calling McCarthy's decision to boycott the Jan. 6 committee "the most important development of the entire investigation." And "Pelosi's decision to keep the Jan. 6 panel small has enabled her to populate it with members who stay relentlessly on message," he added, singling out Liz Cheney as "a singular, and singularly disciplined, force."

The Jan. 6 House select committee made waves Monday night after revealing a slew of text messages sent to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows during the Capitol riot, urging him to convince then-President Donald Trump to denounce the attack. Everyone from lawmakers, Fox News hosts, and journalists sent missives to Meadows, who had turned over to the committee thousands of emails and messages before abruptly reversing course and refusing to cooperate.

On Tuesday, committee member Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) read aloud a few more of the texts Meadows received that fateful day, these from GOP lawmakers who were writing things like "it is really bad up here on the Hill" and "fix this now." On Monday, the committee voted to recommend holding Meadows in contempt of Congress after he stopped cooperating.

"We as Republicans used to be unified ... in terms of what happened on January 6, and the responsibility the president had to stop it," Cheney added while speaking on Tuesday. "We all remember, every one of us, what Republican leader [Kevin McCarthy] said on the floor of the House the following week: 'The president bears responsibility for Wednesday's attack on Congress by mob rioters.'"

As far as a crime Trump may have committed on Jan. 6, Cheney on both Monday and Tuesday alluded to one, The Washington Post reports. When summing up the texts she shared Monday night, Cheney asked, "Did Donald Trump, through action or inaction, corruptly seek to obstruct or impede Congress's official proceeding to count electoral votes?"

In doing so, she pointed to a "specific criminal statute" that "she suggests [Trump] might have violated," writes the Post. She cited that same statute again on Tuesday morning. Read more at The Washington Post.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) made public on Monday text messages sent to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows from multiple Fox News hosts and Donald Trump Jr., urging him on Jan. 6 to get then-President Donald Trump to denounce his supporters participating in the Capitol riot.

Cheney is the vice chair of the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack, and shared the messages before the panel voted to hold Meadows in contempt for defying their subpoena. Meadows had been cooperating with lawmakers, turning over thousands of documents to the panel from Jan. 6, but then pulled back, claiming the committee wanted him to discuss matters protected under executive privilege.

Cheney read several text messages sent to Meadows on Jan. 6, all of them urgent, imploring Meadows to get Trump to take action. Fox News host Laura Ingraham texted Meadows, "Hey Mark, the president needs to tell people in the Capitol to go home ... this is hurting all of us ... he is destroying his legacy." Another Fox News host, Brian Kilmeade, told Meadows, "Please get him on TV. Destroying everything you have accomplished." Sean Hannity, a Fox News host and Trump friend, asked Meadows, "Can he make a statement? ... Ask people to leave the Capitol."

The pleas were also coming in from Trump relatives, including his eldest son, who asked Meadows to get his father to "condemn this s--t ASAP. The Capitol Police tweet is not enough." Meadows responded, "I'm pushing it hard. I agree." Trump Jr. replied, "We need an Oval address. He has to lead now. It has gone too far and gotten out of hand."

Several hours after the rioters breached the Capitol, Trump released a video where he asked people to "go home," while still claiming the 2020 presidential election was "fraudulent." He added, "We love you. You're very special. ... I know how you feel."

News that the central committee of the Wyoming Republican Party narrowly voted (31-29) this weekend to stop recognizing Rep. Liz Cheney as a member of the GOP is hardly surprising. This is the second time her state party has rebuked her, and there have been similar moves by the Republican caucus in Congress. Cheney has loudly and repeatedly denounced former President Donald Trump's incitement of the Jan. 6 insurrection, and that is sufficient to render her radioactive.

But that doesn't mean the GOP has become a Trump-obsessed cult. It means only that directly attacking the former president is unacceptable. Short of that, a range of responses are possible — and that signals that the party remains divided.

Consider the case of Glenn Youngkin, who just won the governor's race in Virginia, a state where Joe Biden beat Trump by 10 points only a year ago. How did Youngkin do it? Not by bashing Trump, but by ignoring him whenever possible. The result was a campaign broadly continuous with the kind of race former President George W. Bush (or his vice president, Dick Cheney, Liz Cheney's father) might have run. That points to considerable continuity within the Republican Party over the past couple of decades.

But that kind of campaign wouldn't work in Wyoming, or in Arizona, where the GOP has, if anything, fallen even further down the rabbit hole of Trumpian conspiracy theorizing about stolen elections. There are plenty of deep-red House districts around the country where you need to prove yourself a fire-breathing lunatic to prevail. But there are plenty of other places (like Virginia) where such irresponsible antics will doom a candidate.

This division will serve as a strength for the GOP in the 2022 midterms, just as Democratic fissures separating progressives and moderates helped fuel gains for the party in the 2018 midterms. Dividing and conquering is usually a good strategy when there's no need for the party to settle on a single ticket. Candidates can make very different appeals to very different sets of voters.

The question is what the consequences of GOP division will be in 2024, when Republicans will need to settle on a standard-bearer. If Trump runs, it looks like he will easily prevail in that contest. That will make many Republicans happy. But in the general election, will Youngkin voters pull the lever for Trump in greater numbers than they did in 2020? I doubt it — unless loathing for Biden (or whichever Democrat runs instead) holds the GOP together as effectively as hatred for Trump did for Democrats in last year's vote.

Both major parties are marked by division. And both increasingly have only negative partisanship to overcome it.

With a vote of 31-29, the Wyoming GOP Central Committee passed a resolution over the weekend to no longer recognize Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) as a member of the Republican Party.

This comes after several county Republican parties, objecting to Cheney's criticism of former President Donald Trump and his role in inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, voted to no longer recognize her as part of the GOP. Cheney voted to impeach Trump after the attack on the Capitol, saying he "lit the flame."

The central committee's resolution claims, without evidence, that the events of Jan. 6 were triggered by antifa and Black Lives Matter protesters. Cheney is on the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot, and the resolution accuses her of "proudly" pledging allegiance to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and asks House Republican leadership to "immediately remove" Cheney from "all committee assignments and the House Republican conference itself, to assist and expedite her seamless exodus from the Republican Party."

This is symbolic move that does not strip Cheney of any power. In a statement to the Casper Star Tribune, Cheney spokesman Jeremy Adler said "it's laughable to suggest Liz is anything but a committed conservative Republican. She is bound by her oath to the Constitution. Sadly, a portion of the Wyoming GOP leadership has abandoned that fundamental principle, and instead allowed themselves to be held hostage to the lies of a dangerous and irrational man."

When Trump was in office, Cheney — who is up for re-election in 2022 — voted with him on policy 93 percent of the time, siding with Trump more often than his staunch supporters Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), and Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the Star Tribune reports.

If you pull back a bit, things seem "pretty normal" in Washington, D.C., Politico's Playbook team writes Wednesday. Bipartisan support for infrastructure, "pretty typical" internal Democratic wrangling over social investments, and "even Tuesday's results in the off-year election in Virginia, which sent a message to the new president about overreach, were perfectly in line with recent history." But two stories Tuesday, Politico wrote, were a reminder that "outside of the (relatively) routine sausage-making on Capitol Hill, some enormously worrisome undercurrents remain in American politics."

One of the stories involved House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) publicly asking House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to condemn Rep. Paul Gosar's (R-Ariz.) "horrific video" in which his anime avatar murders Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). The other was Rep. Liz Cheney's (R-Wyo.) dire warning about former President Donald Trump and other GOP leaders during a speech in New Hampshire.

"At this moment, when it matters most, we are also confronting a domestic threat that we've never faced before: a former president who's attempting to unravel the foundations of our constitutional republic, aided by political leaders who have made themselves willing hostages to this dangerous and irrational man," Cheney said. She described how Trump, invited by House GOP leaders to a fundraising dinner Monday night, once more whitewashed and justified the Jan. 6 riot by "a violent mob" trying to "overturn the will of the American people."

"Political leaders who sit silent in the face of these false and dangerous claims are aiding a former president who is at war with the rule of law and the Constitution," Cheney said. She said she disagrees with every major decision President Biden has made in office and loves the Republican Party, but "I know this country needs a Republican Party that is based on truth" and "willing to reject the former president's lies."

Harriet Hageman, the Wyoming Republican House candidate lucky enough to receive former President Donald Trump's endorsement in his crusade to unseat incumbent Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), recently called the former commander-in-chief the "greatest president of my lifetime," reports The New York Times.

However, in 2016, Hageman was actually "part of the final Republican resistance to [Trump's] ascent," and attempted to strip him of his presidential nomination at the party's national convention. She also, at the time, described Trump as "the weakest candidate," and condemned him as "racist and xenophobic," writes the Times.

And although she has now completed that "not-so-unfamiliar" journey of former Trump critic to bandwagon supporter, it was not before that fateful convention in 2016. She attended as a delegate for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and reportedly participated regularly in conference calls "plotting the last-gasp opposition" to Trump. She, as well as her counterparts, argued Trump was a "cancer" on the Republican party, writes the Times.

But when the time came, Hageman was ultimately one of only 12 to try and strip his nomination by voting in opposition of "binding delegates."

Trump is aware of both Hageman's support for Cruz in 2016 and her efforts to stop him; notably, however, that hasn't stopped the ex-president from clearing the Wyoming field in her favor. Read more at The New York Times.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) may have been ousted from her leadership position within the Republican Party for speaking out against former President Donald Trump and his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him, but that's not enough for her to say goodbye to the GOP.

"I am not ready to cede the Republican Party," Cheney told 60 Minutes' Lesley Stahl in an interview that aired Sunday night. "And I'm not ready to cede it to the voices of extremism, to the voices of anti-Semitism, and the voices of racism, and there certainly are some in our party. But I'm going to fight for this party. I believe in it."

Several Republicans have announced they are running against her in 2022, and Trump has already endorsed one candidate: attorney Harriet Hageman. Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, has the backing of former President George W. Bush, and he'll hold a fundraiser for her in October. Cheney said her hope is that after the midterms, the "right Republicans" take over, as she doesn't believe House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) should be elected House speaker.

"What my party is doing right now in too many cases is coddling and enabling a man who does not believe in the rule of law and does not believe in the Constitution," Cheney said. "And that is a fundamental recipe to unravel the system."

Cheney made it clear to Stahl that she holds conservative views: she's pro-gun rights and anti-abortion, plus she backs waterboarding and doesn't think it is torture, and she views Democratic policies as "dangerous." But she has changed her mind on one issue: same-sex marriage. Her sister, Mary, is gay and married to a woman, and in 2013, Cheney said she believed in the "traditional definition of marriage." She told Stahl she was "wrong. I was wrong. I love my sister very much. I love her family very much. And I was wrong."

Both of the Republican party's "living former presidents" are going head to head in the fight to save (or upset, depending on how you look at it) incumbent GOP Rep. Liz Cheney and her Wyoming house seat, The Wall Street Journal reports.

According to a copy of an invitation viewed by The Wall Street Journal, former President George W. Bush's "first campaign event of the 2022 midterms" will be a fundraiser to support Cheney, one of former President Donald Trump's top congressional targets. Meanwhile, Trump has thrown his support behind attorney Harriet Hageman in hopes that she upsets Cheney's bid for re-election. The competing endorsements thus pit "two of the biggest names in Republican politics against one another," the Journal writes.

Cheney is the daughter of Bush's vice president, Dick Cheney, as well as a vocal Trump critic. Trump has called her a "warmongering fool" and a "horrible human being," per the Journal.

Notably, Bush also found himself in Trump's crosshairs after denouncing domestic terrorism in his 9/11 commemoration speech — which many saw as alluding to the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, as well as a certain subsection of Trump supporters. "Bush led a failed and uninspiring presidency. He shouldn't be lecturing anybody!" Trump fired back.

Bush's Cheney fundraiser is scheduled for Oct. 18, and co-hosts include, among others, Karl Rove, "a longtime political adviser for [Bush] who also consulted with [Trump] during his 2020 re-election campaign." Read more at The Wall Street Journal.

Former President Donald Trump has reportedly selected the lucky Wyoming Republican House candidate that will receive his endorsement in the primary against frequent Trump critic and incumbent GOP Rep. Liz Cheney (Wyo.).

According to Politico, the ex-president is set to back Harriet Hageman, an attorney who lost a bid for governor in 2018. Insiders say Trump chose Hageman after a robust process interviewing multiple possible Cheney challengers because "she impressed him the most." "He interviewed a lot of people, and when it was done, it was clear she's in a class of her own," one Republican told Politico.

Trump has had it out for Cheney, his "top Republican target," since she condemned both his role in the events of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and his baseless, widespread claims of election fraud, writes Politico. She was later ousted from her House leadership position.

Given the stakes, the Hageman endorsement is "the most important political endorsement yet in Trump's post-presidency," and will "test his political power in the GOP like never before," Politico writes. Although official word is still pending, Trump has already told Hageman that "she has his support," per Politico.

As another step outside of endorsement, in order to prevent a Cheney win via plurality, Trump and his team will need to clear the primary field should it become crowded. "Each candidate has pockets of voters, and they'll all draw votes from each other but not Cheney," said Tex McBride, a conservative activist in Wyoming.

Hageman herself has not yet revealed her candidacy, but did, as a final step, resign from her post on the Republican National Committee on Tuesday. Her official announcement is reportedly expected later this week. Read more at Politico.

Reps. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), the chair and vice chair of the House's Jan. 6 committee, released a statement Saturday dismissing comments made earlier this week by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) about the FBI clearing former President Donald Trump of wrongdoing in connection to the Capitol riot.

In an interview with KGET on Thursday, McCarthy said the FBI and bipartisan Senate committees have investigated Trump's alleged role in the incident and "have found there's no involvement." But Thompson and Cheney, the latter of whom has been exchanging barbs with McCarthy in public throughout the last few months, said that the congressman was basing his comments off an "anonymous report," which they found to be baseless after reaching out to executive branch agencies and other congressional committees. "We will continue to pursue all elements of this investigation in a nonpartisan and thorough manner," the lawmakers said. Read the full statement below.

During a week when the top-rated prime-time show on the country's leading conservative cable news network broadcast propaganda from the stringently anti-liberal government in Hungary, the Republican Party's most outspoken right-wing populists held a fundraiser in the backyard of the GOP's leading critic of the party's direction.

The $2,000/couple fundraiser — hosted by Peter and Stephanie Lamelas, Dan and Carleen Brophy, and Jay and Karen Kemmerer, owners of Jackson Hole Mountain Resort — featured conservative rabblerousers U.S. House Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Jim Jordan, and former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.

That this group of Republicans would hold a fundraiser to enhance the power of the faction of the party most inclined to follow the former president down conspiratorial rabbit holes of self-serving mendacity is hardly surprising. What's a little audacious is that they did it in the home state of Liz Cheney, the member of the House GOP who's been this faction's most uncompromising, vociferous critic.

Cheney has antagonized many in her party by refusing to "move on" from the Jan. 6 insurrection. First she voted to impeach the former president for his role in inciting that day's events. More recently, she agreed to serve on the House select committee investigating the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol after Jordan and his colleague Indiana Rep. Jim Banks were barred from serving by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, helping to keep the committee bipartisan. And in between these events, she's been a constant gadfly, speaking out nearly every day about ominous, anti-democratic trends in her party.

This makes Cheney quite popular in the dwindling ranks of Never Trump Republicans as well as among the mainstream media's many centrist liberals. But Cheney's stands have also left her politically vulnerable in her home state, where she is likely to face a potent primary challenge from the right in 2022.

In holding a big-ticket fundraiser in Cheney's home state, the faction of the GOP aiming to take her down has fired its first round of high-powered artillery in her direction.