Opinion | How Liz Cheney helped create her own downfall – By Zeeshan Aleem (MSNBC) / Aug 20, 2022
Cheney was an enthusiastic participant in the radical political style that helped bring about Trumpism.
Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming has been feted as a hero by prominent liberals and Never Trump Republicans alike for her refusal to cave in to 2020 election denialism, even though it cost her a seat in Congress. After her loss, she suggested that she too sees herself as walking among a pantheon of American heroes, explicitly linking herself to Abraham Lincoln in her concession speech and immediately launching a political action committee called “The Great Task,” a nod to Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg address delivered during the Civil War.
In reality, Cheney is far from a hero. Yes, her work as vice chair of the House Jan. 6 committee has been honorable, and it is a sign of basic decency that she refused to equivocate on the 2020 election in order to cling to her seat. But what’s being overlooked is that she was part of the very problem that she decries.
It’s not just that Cheney was a proud Trump ally until he attempted an insurrection, which in and of itself should temper calls to lionize her. It’s that she was an enthusiastic participant in the radical political style that helped bring about Trump’s authoritarian break from liberal democracy. If she helped start the fire and only tried putting it out after the whole house was aflame, then her current path isn’t courageous dissent as much as it is belatedly making amends for complicity in our crisis.
