In a new opinion piece published in The Washington Post on Wednesday, Rep. Liz Cheney re-affirmed her commitment to opposing the lies that former President Donald Trump and some of his top allies have spread about the integrity of the 2020 presidential election. In summation, Cheney described Trump’s following as a “cult.” Trump, of course, has claimed that the election was somehow rigged for Joe Biden, but no credible evidence for this idea has ever emerged. The lies, though, helped inspire the rioting at the Capitol in January — and that violence has not swayed Trump from spreading the election lies.
Discussing Trump’s recent repeated false assertions that he was the rightful winner of the 2020 presidential election, Cheney wrote in her Post piece that “Trump repeats these words now with full knowledge that exactly this type of language provoked violence on Jan. 6.” Trump, according to Cheney’s description, “is seeking to unravel critical elements of our constitutional structure that make democracy work — confidence in the result of elections and the rule of law,” and “[no] other American president has ever done this.”
Cheney has recently faced pressure over her position of leadership among House Republicans, and her role as the third-ranking member of the House GOP caucus could be drawing to a close. Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.), the second-ranking Republican in the House, recently said that he supports replacing Cheney in GOP leadership with Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), a Trump loyalist. Cheney seems undeterred. In the Post, she added as follows:
‘The question before us now is whether we will join Trump’s crusade to delegitimize and undo the legal outcome of the 2020 election, with all the consequences that might have. I have worked overseas in nations where changes in leadership come only with violence, where democracy takes hold only until the next violent upheaval. America is exceptional because our constitutional system guards against that… While embracing or ignoring Trump’s statements might seem attractive to some for fundraising and political purposes, that approach will do profound long-term damage to our party and our country. Trump has never expressed remorse or regret for the attack of Jan. 6 and now suggests that our elections, and our legal and constitutional system, cannot be trusted to do the will of the people.’
Trump’s rhetoric, Cheney added, “is immensely harmful, especially as we now compete on the world stage against Communist China and its claims that democracy is a failed system.” Alongside other suggestions for the path ahead, Cheney concluded in part by stating that Republicans “need to stand for genuinely conservative principles, and steer away from the dangerous and anti-democratic Trump cult of personality.” Referring to Trump’s following as a “cult” seems pretty direct.
Check out Cheney’s full opinion piece at this link.
