ABC News aired an interview today with Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), whose feelings about former President Donald Trump are well-known. It came as no surprise when she said, “I don’t think the [Republican] Party would survive” nominating Trump for president a third time. It’s a perfectly valid assertion of her opinion, no matter how poorly it reflects the perspective of most Republicans.
But then, Jonathan Karl asked her what I think is perhaps the most laughably inapt question on any show this week.
“So, do you run for president if — I mean, do you see yourself running for president as a way to prevent what you say would be a destruction of the party and ultimately damaging our country?”
“I haven’t made a decision about that yet,” Cheney replied. “And I’m obviously very focused on my reelection. I’m very focused on the Jan. 6 committee. I’m very focused on my obligations to do the job that I have now. And I’ll make a decision about ‘24 down the road.”
I know there is this belief among Beltway media that the Jan. 6 committee is important and that it broke some ground this week with the testimony about Trump’s well-known temper and persistently intemperate behavior. But you don’t have to drink the Trump Kool-Aid or want to see the man returned to power to understand the shambolic nature of these proceedings and to discount them appropriately.
Fortunately, we live in a nation of laws. Those involved in storming the Capitol are being or have been prosecuted. As far as the vast majority of people are concerned, that was the end of things more than a year ago.
Trump, on the other hand, will not be prosecuted. I know that a lot of people are trying to talk themselves into believing that there’s a viable criminal case against him here. All I can say is, you can talk yourself into believing it, but you can’t talk it into happening.
This committee was created during an election year in order to try to give the Jan. 6 incident a much longer shelf life and much greater significance than it would have had otherwise. Ideally, the goal was to stretch this into the fall. The committee had already failed to extend that incident’s relevance long before Cassidy Hutchinson testified last week.
But because some people have missed that memo — most of them Beltway media types, already having crawled deep down the committee’s rabbit hole — Jon Karl is now asking Liz Cheney if she’s going to run for president. So how close is Liz Cheney to running for president?
Well, she is about to lose her primary election by 25 points or more. (I would take the “over” on that.) She’s begging Wyoming Democrats to switch parties so that they can vote on Aug. 16. It won’t work — this sort of thing never does.
I’m aware that television journalists thrive on inducing people to announce big things like presidential runs. Still, if you’re going to ask Cheney that question, you might as well be asking me whether I’ll be trying out as a long-distance runner in the 2024 Olympics.
And for the record, I haven’t made a decision about that yet.
