The Republican National Committee is slated to push forward a resolution to censure Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, the two Republicans on the House Select Jan.6 committee colluding with Democrats to incriminate Trump and patriots for protesting the fraudulent election.
The resolution to censure Cheney and Kinzinger, two of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump after Americans protesting the stolen election on January 6, garnered several dozen sponsors, was cleared by the RNC on Thursday and it “is likely to be approved by the RNC’s full body at its winter meeting on Friday,” Politico reports.
“This is not about them being anti-Trump,” Dhillon said. “There are plenty of other people in the party who are anti-Trump whose names don’t appear in the resolution. These two took specific action to defy party leadership,” Harmeet Dhillon, national committeeperson from California and one of several dozen sponsors of the resolution.
Initially, members of the RNC, led by Maryland RNC member David Bossie, called for the expulsion of Cheney and Kinzinger from the House Republican Conference.
But some RNC members feared her removal involves using “unnecessarily inflammatory” language, “engaging in intraparty warring” and would “create a political headache for both the House minority leader Kevin McCarthy and RNC chair Ronna McDaniel, Politico notes.
New Jersey national committeeperson Bill Palatucci is relieved by the RNC’s decision to censure instead of ousting Cheney.
“I still don’t think it’s a good idea,” he told reporters. “I’m glad it was watered down to essentially just a statement of the committee. But we should be shooting at Democrats, not Republicans.”
Kinzinger is not seeking reelection this year. Cheney’s re-election prospects are slim. In November, Wyoming Republican leaders voted not to recognize Cheney as a member of their party.
Cheney’s primary challenger, Trump-endorsed GOP activist Harriet Hageman, is trouncing Cheney in polls.
According to a recent SoCo Strategies survey of Republican voters, Hageman “leads Cheney, 38%-18%. State Representative Anthony Bouchard is at 12% and 26% are undecided,” Washington Examiner reports.
The Wyoming Republican Party voted in November to no longer recognize Cheney as a member of their party.
Cheney blasted the Republican Party for proposing her censure, warning GOP leaders are “willing hostages” to Trump.
Her deputy chief of staff Maura Gillespie, Kinzinger fired back against the RNC in an email, warning the party’s “time would be better served by focusing on 2022 rather than an unprecedented and shortsighted effort to purge two lifelong Republicans for simply telling the truth and upholding their oaths of office.”