Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., noting the “cancel culture of the right,” offered his strong support for Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo.
According to the The New York Times, Kinzinger recently formed a political action committee, Country First, that will support anti-Donald Trump Republicans like Cheney.
“She just has to get through this moment,” Kinzinger said. “Look, this whole cancel culture of the right, it’s about people who feel threatened because they look bad when someone like Liz is strong and actually stands for what she believes. I think she’ll survive.”
Newsweek pointed out that both Cheney and Kinzinger were among the 10 Republicans in the House who voted in January to impeach then-President Trump.
Some Republicans and Trump had blasted Cheney, chair of the House Republican Conference, for her actions. They have urged GOP voters to support challengers to her in Wyoming’s 2022 Republican primary.
And in an interview with Newsmax TV last month, the former president dismissed Cheney as a “hopeless case.”
“They have to do their job,” Trump said of Cheney and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “If they do their job, great. I think Liz Cheney is a hopeless case, and Mitch, we’ll see whether or not he can do his job.”
After her vote to impeach Trump, Republican parties in at least 10 Wyoming counties had censured her.
“[Cheney] betrayed the trust and failed to honor the will of the very large majority of motivated Wyoming voters who elected her,” the Sweetwater County Republican Party said.
“Because she voted in an anarchic proceeding against President Donald J. Trump, which was conducted in contravention of established principles of due process – a proceeding that provided no probative evidence for consideration, called no witnesses to testify under oath, permitted no questioning of the accusers by the accused – Rep. Liz Cheney stood in defiance of the quantifiable will of the substantial majority of Wyoming citizens and devalued the political influence of the State of Wyoming.”
Meanwhile, Kinzinger, who was first elected to Congress in 2010, has also drawn censures and rebukes from local Republicans who vowed to support a GOP challenger.
Catalina Lauf, a strong Trump supporter, has announced primary plans to oppose Kinzinger.
“Over this last year — over the last two or three years, really — the country’s been in a lot of turmoil and we’re seeing that manifest itself in Congress,” Lauf said.
“And now you have a representative like Adam who would rather spend his time and platform talking about impeachment and censoring [Rep.] Marjorie Taylor Greene [R-Ga.] — another member of Congress. That’s not representing the values of our district, and it’s not servant leadership.”
