Campaign

Cheney fuels speculation about her next move

by Caroline Vakil - 03/13/24 6:00 AM ET

Speculation is growing about the role former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) will play in the 2024 election as President Biden and former President Trump barrel toward a rematch.

Cheney has vowed that she’ll do whatever it takes to keep Trump from returning to the White House. She has left the door open to running an independent bid and recently launched her political action committee, the Great Task, after Nikki Haley dropped her long-shot primary challenge against Trump.

At the same time, she has said she won’t be a spoiler third-party candidate if it helps Trump — leaving some Democrats curious, even hopeful, she’ll publicly endorse Biden instead.

“If you had asked me 20 years ago, whether I thought it was a really good idea for Democrats to team up with a Cheney, I would have told you that you were drinking something,” said Democratic strategist Jennifer Holdsworth. “But in this day and age, I think the more democracy-focused folks we have working towards the same goal, the better.”

Holdsworth said she would “welcome” a Cheney endorsement despite their policy differences and Cheney’s track record on issues such as women’s rights, while also acknowledging such a move would complicate the former congresswoman’s future political ambitions.

Cheney underwent a sudden political evolution in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack, going from a once-rising GOP star to someone vilified by her party for her opposition to Trump.

Former Rep. Liz Cheney speaks at The 92nd Street Y New York on June 26, 2023 in New York City. (Gary Gershoff/Getty Images)

Despite her conservative track record, she was ousted from her position as House GOP conference chair and lost her primary last cycle to a Trump-backed challenger over her objection to Trump’s baseless claims about the 2020 elections and his conduct during the Capitol riot.

Instead, she’s become one of the main faces of the anti-Trump movement, having sat on a bipartisan panel to investigate Jan. 6 and using her platform to target Trump-aligned candidates, including Arizona’s Mark Finchem and Kari Lake, during the November 2022 midterms, while endorsing some Democrats, such as Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.).

Since leaving office, she has also released a memoir and doubled down on her criticism of Trump — the kind of behavior that might signal presidential ambitions.

Cheney has said as recently as January that she is leaving the door open to a White House run.

“I haven’t made a decision about that,” she said on “The View” in January. “But I think it’s really important, I mean, what you said — this election cycle, everybody has to go vote. Everybody has to go vote, and you’ve got to be willing to say, ‘Look, I’m not necessarily going to vote for the candidate who belongs to the party that I belong to, I’m going to find the candidate who I know I can trust to defend the Constitution.’”

Cheney has also said she would not do anything to aid Trump. Some Democrats are skeptical she’ll launch an independent candidacy given concerns that it could hurt Biden, but it has left the party wondering what exactly she will do.

Florida-based Democratic pollster Fernand Amandi said it was critical for Cheney to publicly endorse Biden, in the hopes it will attract anti-Trump voters who might otherwise support a third-party candidate.

“The problem is that the specter of third-party candidates means that there could be off-ramps for anti-Trump conservatives swayed by Cheney … who might then vote third party, which would be a benefit for Trump, not Biden,” Amandi said.

Top Stories from The Hill

But some of Cheney’s Democratic colleagues in the House see her message resonating regardless of what she does.

“That’s up to Liz, but she clearly has been a defender of democracy and someone who is sounding the alarm about how dangerous Donald Trump is. I’m comfortable if that’s the role that she occupies,” said Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), who served with her on the House panel investigating the Capitol riot, when asked what role he believed she should play in the 2024 race.

“I think her continuing to talk about Donald Trump being a threat to democracy is enough,” the California Democrat added.

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), another member who served on the House panel, said he hoped to see her reach out to “disaffected and disenchanted Republicans” about Trump and the threat he poses. He didn’t advise her on whether she should endorse Biden.

“I want her to do what is going to be most effective for the preservation of the republic, and she has a very strong gut check on that,” he said.

So far, Cheney has not said whether she’ll endorse the president in the 2024 election, underscoring the tricky political terrain she must navigate as a vocal Trump critic whose ideologies largely still align with the Republican Party.

Though the anti-Trump faction is a minority within the GOP, Cheney’s actions have the potential to sway voters and make the difference in a presidential election that will come down to the wire again in key states such as Arizona and Georgia.

Biden for his part has not talked much about Cheney publicly in recent months, but he has expressed admiration for her, saying in 2022 that “I don’t agree with anything that Liz Cheney believes about the substantive issues, but I admire the hell out of her.”

Still, there’s hope among some Republicans that she will ultimately come home.

Former Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-Ala.), who was close to Cheney when they served in the House, said that while he understands Cheney is a Trump critic, he can’t see her backing Biden either. He said he’d prefer to see her back the former president.

“That doesn’t mean she has to agree with President Trump,” Byrne said, but added that “this is truly a binary choice” between Biden and Trump.

It’s an argument other Republicans, like former Attorney General Bill Barr, have made too, though it hasn’t swayed Cheney.

Democrats believe there’s a place for her in this election even if she occupies her own lane.

“You don’t have to always put on the same jersey to be on the same team. And I think that there are ways that [anti-Trump Republicans] can play ball without wearing our jersey,” Democratic strategist Antjuan Seawright said. “Because it truthfully could, again, have unintended consequences if they were to do so.”

Mychael Schnell contributed to this report.