This is of a piece with the immediately prior post.
House Republicans oust a defiant
Liz Cheney for her repudiation
House Republicans purged Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming from their leadership ranks on Wednesday, voting to oust their No. 3 for her refusal to stay quiet about Donald J. Trump’s election lies, in a remarkable takedown of one of their own that reflected the party’s intolerance for dissent and unswerving fealty to the former president.
The action came by voice vote during a brief but raucous closed-door meeting in an auditorium on Capitol Hill on Wednesday morning, after Ms. Cheney made a defiant final speech that drew boos from her colleagues.
In her parting remarks, Ms. Cheney...warned that Republicans were going down a path that would bring their “destruction” and “possibly the destruction of our country,” the person said, and she added that if the party wanted a leader who would “enable and spread his destructive lies,” they should vote to remove her.
Republicans did just that after greeting her speech with jeers, according to two people present, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe an internal discussion. They opted not to hold a recorded vote after Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the Republican leader, said that they should vote by voice to show unity.
Emerging from the meeting, Ms. Cheney...said she was committed to doing “everything I can to ensure that the former president never again gets near the Oval Office.”
“We must go forward based on truth,” Ms. Cheney told reporters. “We cannot both embrace the big lie and embrace the Constitution.”
Last night Cheney gave her final speech as a party leader on the floor of the House:
...Ms. Cheney took a fiery last stand, warning that former President Donald J. Trump had created a threat that the nation had never seen before: a president who had “provoked a violent attack” on his own Capitol “in an effort to steal the election,” and then continued to spread his election lies.
“Remaining silent and ignoring the lie emboldens the liar,” Ms. Cheney said. “I will not participate in that. I will not sit back and watch in silence while others lead our party down a path that abandons the rule of law and joins the former president’s crusade to undermine our democracy.”
...
Ms. Cheney’s remorseless last stand — and the chilly reception it received from House Republicans, who cleared from the chamber as she began her remarks — also highlighted how Republican leaders, even in their eagerness to rebuild their party after the riot and Mr. Trump’s stormy departure from the White House, have tethered themselves to his election lies as a matter of survival.
