After then-House Republican Conference Chair Liz Cheney voted to impeach Donald Trump for inciting a deadly insurrectionist attack, more than a few of her GOP colleagues said she’d committed a partisan betrayal that could not stand. Far-right members came up with a specific goal: They wanted to remove the Wyoming congresswoman from her leadership post.
As regular readers may recall, that effort initially failed badly, in part because House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy had Cheney’s back.
The day after the impeachment vote, the chamber’s top GOP member sided with Cheney over her intra-party critics. After far-right members tried and failed to oust Cheney from her conference position, McCarthy told reporters, “People can have differences of opinion…. Liz has a right to vote her conscience. At the end of the day, we will be united.”
That was in February 2021. In February 2022, McCarthy is less focused on unity, and more focused on driving Cheney from Congress. NBC News reported yesterday:
In a highly unusual move, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy on Thursday endorsed Harriet Hageman, the Trump-backed candidate challenging Rep. Liz Cheney in the Wyoming Republican primary. “I am proud to endorse Harriet Hageman for Congress,” McCarthy, R-Calif., said in a statement tweeted by Hageman. “I look forward to welcoming Harriet to a Republican majority next Congress.”
House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik — who replaced Cheney in the GOP leadership after members turned against the Wyoming congresswoman — also endorsed Hageman yesterday, calling her “a true America First patriot.”
The subtext was hardly subtle: This is about who is and is not aligned with the former president.
The fact that Republican leaders have settled on Hageman is of practical interest because the incumbent, at least for now, has five intra-party rivals ahead of her Aug. 16 primary. The more the anti-Cheney vote is fragmented, the more likely it is that the congresswoman will survive the process. (Wyoming has no runoff law. Whichever candidate gets the most votes advances, whether he or she reaches the 50 percent threshold or not.)
But as notable as those details are, more striking is the bigger picture: In Congress, party leaders nearly always try to look out for their members. Party leader endorsing a primary challenger against a member of their conference is extraordinarily unusual.
And yet, here we are. For her part, Cheney’s office was asked for her reaction to Hageman welcoming McCarthy’s endorsement. A Cheney spokesperson said in a statement, “Wow. She must really be desperate.” Ouch. I don’t know if Cheney’s congressional career will soon end, but I do know her relationship with McCarthy has reached an irreparable place. Complicating matters a bit, Republicans aren’t just rallying behind Hageman in Wyoming, they’re also exploring ways to alter the elections process to help ensure their preferred outcome. Politico reported yesterday: Former President Donald Trump and his allies have been privately lobbying Wyoming lawmakers to change the state’s election laws as part of an effort to unseat Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.). On Thursday, Trump endorsed Wyoming legislation that would prevent crossover voting in a primary election. Were the law to pass, Democrats, Republicans, or independents would no longer be able to switch party affiliation on the day of the state’s primary to vote for a candidate in another party.
In other words, Trump and his allies fear the possibility of Democratic and independent voters participating in the GOP’s open primary, and tilting the results in Cheney’s favor. The goal is to close the primary now, limiting it to Republican voters exclusively, to help ensure Cheney’s defeat.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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