Liz Cheney's conduct 'very troubling' but likely not criminal, Jonathan Turley says
Fox News legal contributor reacts to House Republicans calling for the FBI to investigate former Rep. Liz Cheney for 'witness tampering' in the Jan. 6 investigation as President Biden reportedly considers preemptive pardons before leaving office.
One thing that Washington politicians and Hollywood celebrities have in common is a tendency to give themselves pointless and unearned awards, and this week President Joe Biden took the practice to a whole new level of absurdity.
On Thursday, former Wyoming House representative, and Trump hater-in-chief, Liz Cheney received the Presidential Citizens Medal for her work co-chairing the House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack along with the other co-chair, Rep. Benny Thompson.
So, here’s the thing: Regardless of how one feels about the events of J6, the January 6 committee, with its glitzy prime-time hearings, was by any reasonable measure an abject and total failure.
The American people were promised a smoking gun that would forever end Donald Trump’s political career. Instead, Cheney and Thompson delivered a bone-dry super soaker. Oh, and by the way, Trump is going to be back in office in two weeks.
Cheney's hatred of Donald Trump may have cost her her seat on the House. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson; Reuters/Kevin Lamarque)
Bang up job, guys! Here’s your medal.
Just how big of a failure was the Cheney-led, Soviet-style show trial? Well, according to Monmouth University, prior to the hearings in 2022, 42 percent of Americans held Trump directly responsible for the riot on January 6, and after the ridiculous spectacle, that number had fallen to 38 percent.
Millions of dollars were wasted, thousands of man hours were blown, a former ABC News producer was brought in to glam things up and all to no avail, because the American people know a sham trial when they see one.
This is the same Liz Cheney, after all, who, prior to succumbing to Trump Derangement Syndrome, said in 2020, that actions taken against Trump by the FBI during Russiagate sounded, "like a coup," and might even be "treason."
But by the summer of 2022, Cheney saw a chance to get rid of Donald Trump once and for all, and restore the Republican Party to the good old-fashioned establishment types such as herself.
Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS). who chaired the January 6 committee, also received the medal. (Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images) ((Photo by Kent Nishimura/Getty Images))
Trump, Cheney argued, was an insurrectionist who illegally opposed the certification of ballots in a free and fair election! Never mind, of course, that Co-Chair Thompson himself refused to vote to certify the 2004 election. That was apparently different somehow.
In these hearings, a parade of disgruntled former White House officials and a handful of Capitol Police officers, among others, were profusely praised from a dais full of seething Trump-despising Democrats and two Republicans, Cheney and Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who might hate Trump even more.
What really did in Cheney was how unrelentingly insufferable she became once the Trump obsession kicked in.
The entire ridiculous enterprise had all the fidelity to fairness of flipping a coin and yelling, "heads I win, tails you lose."
And speaking of losing, in the midst of the committee’s ten televised hearings in the summer of 2022, Liz Cheney lost her primary to Harriet Hageman by nearly 40 points. The fire of her hatred for Donald Trump had finally consumed Liz Cheney’s political career.
What really did in Cheney was how unrelentingly insufferable she became once the Trump obsession kicked in.
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Nothing else mattered. Not the border, not the economy, not Joe Biden’s corruption or incapacity. The only thing that existed in the universe was the unique and evil supposed threat of Trump.
Even the boneheaded Kamala Harris campaign trotted out old Angry Liz to monger fear amongst non-existent "Republicans for Harris." Trump’s most fanatical detractors cannot understand why everyone isn’t waking up in cold sweats over Trump like they are.
Liz Cheney could have stood by her party and her caucus in 2022. She could have refused to participate in the unfair trial of Trump, even while being critical of him. Had she done so, she would likely still be in Congress. But, instead, the insufferable scion of the Cheney political dynasty threw it all away because she thought she knew better than the people she served.
Now, instead of a seat in the halls of power, Cheney has a useless bauble bestowed upon her by a defeated, lame-duck president.
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Who can say what is next for Liz? Maybe her own Netflix special, after all, if someone as brutally unpopular as Meghan Markle can get a show, maybe someone as insufferable as Cheney can, too.
Perhaps, one day Cheney will add an Emmy to her Presidential Citizens Medal, but one thing is for sure: Liz Cheney will never again be anywhere near power in the Republican Party, and that is very good news, indeed.
Enjoy the medal, Liz. And the early retirement.
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