Liz Cheney has been a godsend for democracy, but she doesn't fit anywhere in US politics
Rep. Liz Cheney sounded like she was giving a
farewell address at the history-making public finale of the Jan. 6 committee, but I’m sure we haven’t heard the last of her.
The great mystery now is whether she has a future in American politics.
The
departing Wyoming Republican said Monday that former President Donald Trump is "unfit for any office" and should never "serve in any position of authority in our nation again." Her sharp-edged certainty, deployed to save democracy, has been a gift to Democrats, fellow Republican resisters and, above all, America.
But
today's GOP is hostile to Cheney precisely because of that mission. And unless working with the opposition has upended her worldview, the Democratic Party won't be a fit, either.
This is a lawmaker who, in her first 15 days in office in 2017, accused then-President Barack Obama of “
aiding America’s enemies” and trying to “undermine the constitutional
rights of gun owners”; co-sponsored bills to reverse the “
devastating impact” of “Obama-era regulations” and ******* states to
recognize concealed-carry gun permits from other states; and voted to repeal the “
trainwreck of Obamacare.” As recently as August 2020, Cheney issued a news release headlined, “
Socialism has a chokehold on the Democratic Party.”
Signs of a hard line softening?
And yet, amid all that early overheated rhetoric, Cheney co-sponsored "a bipartisan bill" to
remove the gray wolf from the endangered species list. And at least twice in 2018, she voted yes on overwhelmingly bipartisan bills to reform the
criminal justice system and fight the
opioid epidemic.
Even apart from Trump and the Capitol attack, however, Cheney's record has been notably more bipartisan this year. She worked with Democrats on bills to
expand telehealth and improve U.S. tools to strengthen
global democracy. She voted for bipartisan initiatives on
gun safety, investment in U.S.
semiconductor manufacturing, a binding
Puerto Rico statehood referendum and, after
reversing her opposition to same-sex marriage last year, the
Respect for Marriage Act.
Cheney as protector of elections
So there is that Liz Cheney – and there is the one who declared on ABC News in August that "we've got election deniers that have been nominated for really important positions all across the country. And I'm going to
work against those people. I'm going to work to support their opponents."
Cheney kept that promise. She helped
defeat election deniers Kari Lake and Mark Finchem, the Arizona GOP candidates for governor and secretary of state. And for the first time in her life, Cheney
crossed the aisle to help Democrats. She endorsed Reps. Abigail Spanberger of Virginia and Elissa Slotkin of Michigan, and even
campaigned with Slotkin. She also
endorsed Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, who lost his Senate bid.
When Cheney lost her own primary in August, she vowed, “I will do
whatever it takes to ensure that Donald Trump is never anywhere near the Oval Office, and I mean it.” The next day she acknowledged she was
mulling a presidential campaign. And in October she did not disagree with the suggestion that as an independent candidate, she could
stop Trump if he's the 2024 nominee.
An electoral failsafe against Trump
That looks increasingly less likely, but even if someone Trumpish is the Republican standard-bearer, it’s easy to see the outlines of an independent Cheney candidacy and its impact. Conservatives would be split, opening a path for Democrats to unite and win.