Just 24 hours ago, Florida Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz was boasting to anyone who would listen that he had secured the votes to kick Rep. Liz Cheney out of House Republican leadership. Unfortunately for Gaetz, it was the Wyoming congresswoman who had the last laugh, at least for now. The overwhelming majority of Republicans voted to keep Cheney as the conference chairwoman.
Sure, the 61 Republicans who voted to remove her marks an increase from the 12 House Republicans who followed through on their 2013 attempt to remove fellow avatar of the establishment, John Boehner, from the House speakership. But considering the clandestine nature of leadership votes and the steep drop-off from the House’s public impeachment vote, the conservatives wishing to reclaim the party from the Sedition Caucus have reason to smile.
Consider that 197 House Republicans, including ones who had lambasted former President Donald Trump’s lies baselessly claiming the election was rigged, voted not to impeach the former president after he instructed a mob to go to the Capitol and “stop the steal” — resulting in a Capitol storming that killed five people, including a police officer. But when offered the chance to take revenge on Cheney for voting in favor of impeaching Trump, 145 Republicans, that is, the overwhelming majority of those who voted against impeachment, decided to keep her in leadership.
The takeaway is clear. Without the fear of a public vote and the backlash from Trump and his minions, members could vote their conscience. Luckily for both the party and the country, the majority of the GOP still has one.
And, of course, Cheney knew this. Gaetz was bluffing. By beckoning a formal vote, Cheney reasserted her mandate to run the conference.
The GOP is still, suffice it to say, in shambles. That Republicans were even considering doling out a harsher punishment to Cheney for voting to impeach a president who caused an attack on the Capitol than to conspiracy theorist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene for, among other things, calling for the execution of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, is a sign of the moral rot in the party. But those conservatives calling to burn the party down or abandon it all together ought to look to Cheney, and the sheer volume of her support, and reconsider.
