Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) is not letting up in her efforts to secure accountability for the destruction that Donald Trump has wrought essentially wherever he’s gone, including within the Republican Party, much of which has seemed perfectly willing to follow the former president off into whatever dangerous fantasylands he concocts. After Rep. Tom Rice (R-S.C.) shared his take this weekend that Trump is a “would-be tyrant” — a descriptor that the Congressman shared after Trump sharply criticized Rice at a rally in South Carolina, Cheney indicated her agreement and insisted that more Republicans than are willing to publicly admit as much know that Rice is correct. As the Congresswoman laid it out:
‘Our country needs Republicans to be sane, responsible, and speak the truth. [Rep. Tom Rice] is right. Most of our Republican colleagues know this. Their silence enables the danger.’
Our country needs Republicans to be sane, responsible, and speak the truth. @RepTomRice is right. Most of our Republican colleagues know this. Their silence enables the danger.
GOP congressman calls Trump 'a would-be tyrant' | TheHill https://t.co/0PYw8RMsMk
— Liz Cheney (@Liz_Cheney) March 13, 2022
Cheney is well-positioned to continue going after accountability on this front in her role as vice chair of the House committee investigating the Capitol riot. That panel has already collected large amounts of relevant information, and they’re continuing their pursuit of details that could help sketch out the circumstances that directly led to the attack on the Capitol. Recently, for example, the committee publicly acknowledged a subpoena for Salesforce, a company that provided some of the tech capacity for Trump’s side to send out substantial numbers of fundraising emails in the lead-up to January 6 — emails that pushed the then-president’s false claims of fraud and the notion that urgent action needed to be taken. As the committee explained it, “The Select Committee issued a subpoena to an email fundraising vendor in order to help investigators understand the impact of false, inflammatory messages in the weeks before January 6th, the flow of funds, & whether contributions were actually directed to the purpose indicated.”
It’s amazing when you think about it: Trump is obsessed with this idea of manliness, and he is the most soft coddled person I’ve met. Not kidding.
BUT This has to drive him crazy: Vladimir Zelensky at 5’7” is three times the man both he and @CawthornforNC are combined.
— Adam Kinzinger (@AdamKinzinger) March 12, 2022
It’s been reported that panel investigators have been examining whether to issue criminal referrals to the Justice Department over offenses including wire fraud because of the potential that donor money was brought in under the knowingly false pretenses of a legitimate fight to correct a legitimately dubious presidential election process. The committee has already laid out in a court filing tied to a judicial battle with ex-Trump lawyer John Eastman that they believe the former president to possibly be guilty of crimes including obstruction of an official proceeding. The proceeding in question was last year’s joint Congressional session to certify the presidential election outcome, which Trump unsuccessfully tried to derail. Referrals for any of these offenses wouldn’t be binding — they’d merely constitute recommendations for prosecution, but they’d presumably come with substantial evidence gathered by investigators.
Republican Tom Rice on Trump's visit to South Carolina:
"He is consumed by spite. I took one vote he didn't like and now he's chosen to support a yes man candidate who has and will bow to anything he says, no matter what."
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) March 13, 2022
