Liz Cheney says House GOP chaos is “direct result” of Kevin McCarthy-Donald Trump alliance

Former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney said the spell of disorder gripping the House of Representatives as her party fails to elect a new speaker, essentially stalling business in Congress, “is a direct result” of Kevin McCarthy’s alliance with former President Donald Trump.

“I think what you’re seeing right now and among the Republicans in the House is a direct result of the decisions that Kevin McCarthy made to embrace Donald Trump, to embrace the most radical and extreme members of our party, that elevate them,” said Cheney during an appearance on “Face the Nation” Sunday. “So it’s not a surprise that we are where we are, but it’s a disgrace, and it’s an embarrassment.”

The House has been without a speaker since Oct. 3, when McCarthy was ousted in a historic vote, the first time in history a speaker has been removed in a vote. The party first nominated Majority Leader Steve Scalise to succeed McCarthy, but within days, Scalise withdrew his name from consideration. 

House Republicans last week then nominated Rep. Jim Jordan, who has continued to cast doubt on the results of the 2020 election as recently as Friday and who has been a close ally of Trump’s, to be the next speaker. But the GOP dropped him on Friday as his nominee after he failed to get enough 217 votes in three ballots on the House floor, and now nine Republicans have thrown their names to become the next speaker. 

A Republican who represented Wyoming’s at-large congressional district in the House from 2017 until 2023 and a vocal critic of the former president after the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, Cheney held the third-highest leadership position among House Republicans as chair of the House Republican Conference, for two years of her tenure, between 2019 and 2021. After being removed from the leadership role by McCarthy, Cheney lost a primary to a Trump-backed Republican. 

But Cheney has indicated that she is not done with politics, and rumors have been swirling that she could potentially enter the race for the Republican nomination for president. 

While not directly addressing the presidential race, Cheney told “Face the Nation” moderator Margaret Brennan on Sunday that she will continue to “very much focus on making sure that we get people elected at all levels, who are serious.”  

As for the disorganized effort to elect a new speaker of the House, Cheney said “there certainly are serious people among the Republicans” who could fit the bill for that position, and she said she believes it is important for Republicans to find a candidate who will not attempt to deny election results and who will support continued aid to Ukraine amid the Russian invasion. 

Whether to bundle aid to Ukraine with aid to Israel — as per a $10 billion request from President Joe Biden to Congress last week, citing U.S. national security interests — has divided Republican lawmakers in the House, as has the decision over a nominee to replace McCarthy as speaker since he was ousted in a historic no-confidence vote last month. The vote to remove him came as part of a far-right revolt within the House, as more extreme members of the GOP stood against McCarthy’s reliance on Democrats to pass a funding bill to avoid a then-looming government shutdown.

Cheney also discussed the domestic threats in recent weeks against federal lawmakers, most of whom are Republican although some are Democrats, too.

“The domestic threats are absolutely being driven by Donald Trump and, unfortunately, some of his supporters who, in fact have encouraged and taken steps that have resulted in, as we saw on January 6, political violence,” she said, citing the death threats that Republican lawmakers say they received as holdouts as Jordan tried to convince the holdouts against him to flip their votes. 

“One of them told me that in response, Congressman [Warren] Davidson said, ‘Well, that’s not Jim Jordan’s fault. That’s your fault for voting against him,'” Cheney said. “That is the kind of encouragement and acceptance of violence that is absolutely has no place in this party, should have no place in our country.”