GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy may finally be fed up with the political machinations of Liz Cheney. Today, when asked about the situation involving Cheney joining forces with Nancy Pelosi for a January 6th select committee, McCarthy said he couldn’t remember the last time he had talked to her, and called her a “Pelosi Republican.” Apparently, he was also talking about Adam Kinzinger, but honestly, who cares?

That represents another escalation between Cheney and the party she is ostensibly still a part of, and it appears clear that there’s no repairing this relationship.

House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy told me “we’ll see” when asked if Cheney and Kinzinger will be punished for serving on Jan 6 committee. I asked him the last time he talked to either of them: “Couldn’t tell you.” He called them “Pelosi Republicans.” pic.twitter.com/jMyjJBoq5I

— Emily Goodin (@Emilylgoodin) July 26, 2021

As I wrote previously, Cheney is a hypocrite, and her full-blown endorsement of Pelosi’s committee shows that. If she were truly operating on principle, she would not be agreeing to do the bidding of the Democrat Party while the head of the committee is a man who objected to the electoral college in 2004 and another member objected in 2016. Cheney has repeatedly scolded Republicans who objected to the election in 2020, yet she is literally allying with Democrats who did the same thing. If that doesn’t make sense to you, you aren’t the only one.

Of course, when you present that contradiction to Cheney’s few remaining supporters on the right (which mostly consist of establishment commentators), they either don’t respond or deflect. It’s a fact of the situation that can’t be ignored, though, Cheney and her defenders are doing their best to do so.

Further, McCarthy is correct in his assessment. Cheney is a “Pelosi Republican” at this point, and that is completely by her own choice. She has thrown her entire party under the bus to fluff the wants of a San Francisco liberal who would have called Cheney a war-monger five minutes ago. There’s something rather pathetic about a politician who will hold a life-long vendetta against her own allies for disagreeing with her while she forgives all the ills of the other side the moment they ask her to sit at the cool kids’ table.

For her part, Cheney called McCarthy’s comment “childish.”

CHENEY tells us the comment is “pretty childish”
“We’ve got very serious business here. We have important work to do” https://t.co/Kzac8xMNwN

— Nicholas Wu (@nicholaswu12) July 26, 2021

I can’t think of anything more tone-deaf at this point than for Cheney to make more faux appeals to decorum in a situation where she’s locking arms with Nancy Pelosi. There is not serious work to be done here. Rather, there is a partisan investigation stacked with crazed conspiracy theorists (like Adam Schiff and Benny Thompson) that will come to a pre-determined conclusion that Republicans are evil and a threat. That conclusion will then be used as a wedge issue for 2022. Everyone knows that’s the play here, including Cheney, yet she is participating anyway.

I’ve never been a purist in regards to who can be a Republican or not. I understand different parts of the country will produce different types of GOP elected officials. I can deal with Susan Collins in Maine voting against Republicans because I understand the dynamics at play. I get that a GOP representative from New York may vote against tax cuts. Those are things you can work around as a party.

But what’s going on with Cheney isn’t about holding her to some purity test. She’s moved beyond policy disagreement and into the realm of joining with the opposition to destroy her own party. That can not be tolerated.

In other words, McCarthy’s condemnation is a welcome development, but he needs to go further. It’s time to remove Cheney from the House GOP Caucus. That is the only move left.