Arkansas GOP Gov. Hits Own Party on Cheney: ‘She Should Not Be Ousted’ for Voting Her Conscience on Impeachment
On Wednesday CNN’s Erin Burnett asked Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R-AR) to weigh in on the state of his party, specifically the seemingly inevitable removal of Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) as the number three Republican in the House GOP. Reporting indicates Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) is moving to oust Cheney via a Republican conference vote at the behest of Donald Trump, whom Cheney voted to impeach in January for incitement to insurrection.
Trump issued a statement earlier in the slamming Cheney while repeating his Big Lie about the 2020 election, claiming Cheney “has virtually no support left in the Great State of Wyoming” and that she “continues to unknowingly and foolishly say that there was no Election Fraud in the 2020 Presidential Election.”
Hutchinson made his position on Cheney clear:
In terms of Liz Cheney, she’s a conservative. She did a vote of conscience and she should not be ousted because of one vote of conscience. And regardless of the reasons of what’s going to happen in the vote – and it sounds like she’s recognizing that she’s going to be replaced – but this is going to be perceived by the American body politic as an ouster because of one vote. And I don’t think this is healthy for our party, that perception. We’ve got to got back to talking about ideas and how to unify ourselves, and we can’t unify ourselves if we’re pointing at each other and fighting against each other about a perception of January 6th or other issues in the past. We’ve got to come together for 2022. This debate right now will not be perceived as helpful, but divisive.
In February, Hutchinson said flat-out he would not support a Trump presidential bid in 2024.
On Wednesday the Washington Post published an op-ed by Cheney in which she wrote, “While embracing or ignoring Trump’s statements might seem attractive to some for fundraising and political purposes, that approach will do profound long-term damage to our party and our country.”
Watch above via CNN
