The Mask Comes Fully Off: Liz Cheney Campaigning for House Democrats

As a famous space-fantasy movie series villain once said, "Everything is unfolding as I have foreseen." Most anyone who has been watching American politics for the last ten years or so has seen Liz Cheney's descent; her Trump Derangement Syndrome, her being one of Nancy Pelosi's tame Republicans on the J6 Committee, her losing catastrophically in the Wyoming Republican primary to Harriet Hageman, and her continued unhinged rants against all things Trump.

Now her political devolution is complete - Liz Cheney is campaigning for Democratic Congressional candidates.

Former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) is taking her anti-Trump crusade to the congressional battlefield, endorsing Democrats in a pair of contested House races in a sign that she sees the lower chamber as a potential check on former President Trump if he wins a second term in the White House.
On Tuesday, Cheney endorsed John Avlon, a former CNN commentator who’s challenging GOP Rep. Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.) on Long Island. And on Wednesday, she threw her weight behind Rep. Susan Wild, a four-term Democrat who’s in a tight race for reelection in Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley. More endorsements may be forthcoming.

That's a lot of effort to go through just to "get Trump," so there must be something more at work here. It's not the first time, after all, that Cheney has done this.

Cheney has already jumped into the presidential race, announcing in September that she will vote for Vice President Harris in a bid to keep Trump from a second term. And her foray into House contests has precedent: In late 2022, Cheney endorsed a pair of House Democrats with national security backgrounds, Reps. Elissa Slotkin (Mich.) and Abigail Spanberger (Va.), both of whom won tight reelection races that year.

Granted I can't read minds any more than anyone else can, but Cheney's actions are speaking louder than words. I've never cared for the term "Republican in Name Only" (RINO) because it is, all too often, used to mean "Any Republican I disagree with on any single given issue." It's a broad brush that is often wielded too (forgive the expression) liberally. But in Liz Cheney's case, I think the term is appropriate. It's been a long time since Liz Cheney was anywhere near the mainstream of the Republican Party, and while she may still be registered as a Republican, for all intents and purposes she is a Democrat. She is voting for a Democrat for president, she is supporting Democrats in House of Representatives races, she is spreading panic about the possibility of a second Trump term.

Yes, in her case, the title "RINO" fits.

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Unless I miss my guess, Liz Cheney's slide to the left will continue. She's been making noises about a third-party candidacy, although she didn't do it this year. The people of deep-red Wyoming want nothing to do with her, so she holds no office at the moment and will hold no office in the foreseeable future. That's an unalloyed good. But her endorsements still carry some weight among Democrats, because they can point to her endorsement as a claim to be "moderate," seeing as Liz Cheney is, after all, the daughter of Dick Cheney, who the left described as evil incarnate during his vice presidency - and who has joined his daughter in her Trump Derangement Syndrome. But Republicans will, and should, continue to pay her endorsements no heed.

Still, though, I'd still rather go hunting with Liz's dad than with Tim Walz.

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