The Daily - Liz Cheney vs. Marjorie Taylor Greene

Episode Date: February 8, 2021

The departure of President Donald Trump and the storming of the Capitol have reignited a long-dormant battle over the future of the Republican Party.Today, we look at two lawmakers in the Republican House conference whose fate may reveal something about that future: Liz Cheney of Wyoming, who voted in favor of Mr. Trump’s second impeachment, and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, a proponent of conspiracy theories.Guest: Alexander Burns, a national political correspondent for The New York Times. For an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. You can read the latest edition here.Background reading: The Republican leadership would like to blunt President Donald Trump’s influence over the party. Mr. Trump and his allies want to punish those who have crossed him. A series of clashes loom.In back-to-back votes, the Republican conference voted to keep Liz Cheney in a leadership position and the House moved to eject Marjorie Taylor Greene from its committees. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today. In recent days, the Republican Party has taken two votes on what to do about two of its members, Liz Cheney and Marjorie Taylor Greene, who have taken two very different positions on the party's path forward.

My colleague, Alex Burns, on what the outcome of those votes may tell us about the identity crisis playing out inside the GOP. It's Monday, February 8th. Alex, I want to read you a sentence. You ready? Okay. Quote, A divided Republican Party has erupted into open and bitter warfare. Do you remember who wrote that sentence?

I have a feeling that it might be me. Is it me? It's you and it's me. We wrote it together. It was... Was this Mitt Romney in 2016? This is the day that John McCain and Mitt Romney, the two past Republican nominees, denounced Donald Trump as he was about to become the Republican nominee. I remember it well. That was a sort of stunning day, and I think that lead has held up reasonably well. Right. And I revisit that lead now because the concept of a civil war within the Republican Party is not at all new. It starts four years ago when we wrote those sentences,

when it becomes clear that Donald Trump will be the nominee. And you have this dynamic of the establishment Republicans horrified by Trump on one side, the diehard Trump supporters on the other, and those in the middle unwilling or uninterested in speaking up in either direction. And while that dynamic has more or less held over the past four years, the president's supporters have more or less cowed everyone into silence. And so the Civil War has gone into a kind of hibernation, and many in the party seem

to hope that a kind of truce might emerge once the president left office, and they would just kind of find their way forward as a party. But it seems like that's been threatened in recent days. Does that feel right? It does. I think that changes on January 6th in an important way. in an important way. I think it becomes clear on and after the attack on the Capitol that anybody in the party who was under the impression that President Trump was going to ride off into the sunset and they were going to just go back to being the Republican Party as it existed before, you know, really had another thing coming and that there was going to need to be a much more head-on confrontation with the question of the Republican Party's identity. And that has really come to a head, at least in an initial skirmish, over just the last few days in this struggle within the House Republican Conference over the fates of Congresswoman

Liz Cheney from Wyoming and Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene from Georgia. So introduce me to these two lawmakers who are now at the center of this post-Trump Republican fallout battle. And let's start with Cheney. Well, look, I think that what we've watched over the course of the last several weeks certainly tells us how fragile our system is. Well, Liz Cheney is a relatively new arrival in the House. She is in her third term as we speak, but certainly not a new figure in Washington or in Republican politics.

She's the daughter of the former Vice President Dick Cheney. She was a State Department official in the Bush administration. She ran briefly for Senate in her native state of Wyoming a couple cycles ago and then ultimately comes to the House after the 2016 election, rapidly rises to leadership to the role of House conference chair, which makes her the most prominent woman in the Republican Party in the House. OK, so given all that, what exactly does she come to represent in this post-January 6th battle over the Republican Party's future? Well, she becomes, in the immediate aftermath of January 6th, the most prominent and stern voice of censure against the president in the House. Wyoming's only member of the House of Representatives, Liz Cheney, issued a written statement today saying, in part, House Representatives, Liz Cheney, issued a written statement today saying in part, this insurrection caused injury, death, and destruction in the most sacred space in our republic. She votes for impeachment, but she doesn't just vote for impeachment. None of this

would have happened without the president. The president could have immediately and forcefully intervened to stop the violence. He did not. There has never been a greater betrayal by a president of the United States of his office and his oath to the Constitution. I will vote to impeach the president. That is a staggering statement in terms of its moral force and in terms of the challenge that it represents to other Republicans who clearly are not prepared to go as far as she is, either in criticizing Trump verbally or in actually voting to impeach him or censure him in any way. And so what is the reaction from fellow Republicans

to this vote of conscience from Liz Cheney? Well, a lot of them don't see it as a vote of conscience. A lot of them see it as a betrayal. And there are the Republican colleagues who see it as a betrayal on principle that, you know, we're the party of Trump and you are betraying our president. And then there are Republicans who see it as maybe not a betrayal in a moral sense, but certainly lack of political consideration that there are people who don't even necessarily disagree on the substance of what she said, but who would have preferred to kind of keep their heads down and wait for President Trump to leave office and just try to let this a whole unpleasant experience blow over, who then feel that a member of their own leadership has blindsided them by throwing

down the gauntlet. So there's a whole lot of discomfort and resentment directed at Cheney, including by fellow members of Republican leadership who feel like she has put them on the spot in a way that they didn't want to be put on the spot. One of her colleagues, Matt Gaetz, the very, very pro-Trump, very, very Fox News friendly congressman from North Florida, actually goes to Wyoming to try to headline a rally against Cheney calling for her defeat on her home turf. I'll confess to you, this is my first time in Wyoming. I've been here for about an hour, and I feel like I already know the place a lot better than your misguided representative, Liz Cheney.

That's the kind of thing that you rarely see in Republican politics at all, let alone directed at a member of leadership. Right, that is the stuff of a civil war. Now in Washington, D.C., the private insider club of Joe Biden, Mitch McConnell, Mitt Romney, Nancy Pelosi, and Liz Cheney. It is the stuff of a civil war. And it's also the stuff, by the way, that based on our reporting, former President Trump is delighted to see that we know that he has talked to his associates about

enjoying the pain that Liz Cheney seemed to be suffering back home. It's going to be a long two years, but let's go get them. And what you saw in the last few weeks was a real drive from the hard right flank of the Republican conference to strip Liz Cheney of her leadership job to make sure that even if she was going to continue to serve in the House, even if she would continue to be a member of the party, that she would not have that title of conference chair, which does confer a level of authority and stature that your average House member does not have. Okay, so that's Cheney. What about Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene? So I want to tell you guys, the fake news media, the D.C. swamp, the political establishment tried to take me out, but there's definitely more of us than there is of them. So Greene is a figure who comes from a very, very red district in northern Georgia. It's an open seat in the 2020 election. It's a crowded primary. And as this is happening, all kinds of stuff from her past and frankly, really her present

starts to come out in terms of her flirtation with QAnon conspiracy theories, offensive comments that she has made about a range of groups and political figures. So we knew that Marjorie Taylor Greene was an extreme figure last year when she was a candidate for the House. But in the aftermath of the election and the aftermath of January 6th, we see new proof of that over and over again. We see video of her harassing one of the Parkland students, David Hogg, who then becomes a gun control activist. We get new detail on just how outlandish some of her conspiracy theories have been. Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about the Rothschild family using a laser weapon to start fires in California, suggesting that perhaps a plane did

not hit the Pentagon on 9-11. This is just as far out as it gets for somebody who actually holds federal office. And it is a very vivid illustration of the kind of extreme figure who has come into the political arena on the strength of President Trump's movement, but who is actually more extreme than Trump himself. So how do these two House Republicans who could not be further apart in background and belief end up on such a clear collision course? As the Republican Party is debating whether to punish Cheney, whether to eject her from leadership, there's a parallel debate happening both within the Republican Party, but also within the Congress as a whole, involving the Democrats who do control the majority in the

House of Representatives about what to do about somebody as extreme as Marjorie Taylor Greene, somebody who Democrats, I think, unanimously see as complicit in the violence of January 6th and whether somebody like her can be tolerated in the chamber at all, let alone sitting on specific committees like the Education Committee. And we see that debate about what to do about Greene and her place in the House culminate almost literally at the same time as the Republican Party's debate about Cheney in a meeting within the Republican conference this last week. And that sort of inevitably turns these two figures into kind of test cases for the various future identities of the Republican Party. You could see this as a moment where the party is really at a crossroads and where Republican leaders and where rank and file Republicans have to decide,

are you going to be the party of Liz Cheney? Are you going to be the party of Marjorie Taylor Greene? Or are they going to somehow try to be a party that encompasses both of them, that includes both a lawmaker who was one of the most prominent voices encouraging the stop the steal conspiracy theories that culminated on January 6th and someone like Cheney who becomes the loudest and most important voice in the party saying this was an atrocity. We'll be right back. So Alex, what ends up happening at this meeting of Republicans where Cheney and Green's fate will be decided? of truth for Liz Cheney, that if she is going to be removed from her leadership job or if she is going to get a vote of confidence from her colleagues to stay in that role, it's going to happen on Wednesday. And what you have is a combination of Liz Cheney making a plea in her

own defense and then this kind of open air therapy session among her colleagues who speak for and against her. And one of the big questions going into the evening is, will she express any kind of remorse for perhaps not the impeachment vote, but will she acknowledge that she could have communicated better about her intentions? Or will she essentially just throw a bone to other members who feel miffed for one reason or another, but could be persuaded to vote to keep her in leadership? And the answer essentially is no. That what she does is kind of draw a line in the sand and say, this was a vote of conscience for me.

This was a position that I took as a matter of principle. And we ought to be a party that lets people do that. And then very significantly, the last person to speak before a vote is taken is Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader. And in the weeks before this meeting, McCarthy has been kind of all over the map in terms of how he personally is talking about President Trump's role in the events of January 6th, sometimes seeming to entirely let him off the hook, sometimes saying that the president bore some responsibility. He has certainly not tried to match Liz Cheney's moral indignation. And when he gets up to speak, he gives a strong endorsement of keeping her in leadership and

saying, Liz is not going to be on the same page as me on everything, but that she's a valued member of our conference and that I am your leader. You asked me to lead, and this is what I am asking of you. And what happens? They take a secret ballot, and the results are actually not all that close. That Cheney keeps her post by a margin of 145 to 61, so more than two to one in her favor. And for her, it's a real vindication. And for McCarthy, it's a vindication. And for the folks who stuck their necks out on impeachment, it is a sign that at least behind closed doors and at least when it's a secret ballot, and it cannot be turned into a litmus test on social media and on Fox News, folks are willing to stick with somebody like her. Okay, what about Greene? What happens to her in this same meeting? So a lot of members

go into the evening hoping that they hear from Greene a total repudiation of the things that she has said in the past and an apology. And that's not quite what happens, that there are some conflicting reports of exactly how far Green went in the meeting to distance herself from things she has said in the past. It seems clear that there were members who were in the meeting who heard what they wanted to hear, an acknowledgement from her that some of these views are pretty far out and they do not fully represent who she is. But other members, people who are somewhat more like a Liz Cheney figure, hear no apology from Green, or at least not the kind of apology they're looking for, not the kind of full-throated repudiation of her past

comments and behavior that they were hoping for. And that at one point, Greene says to the Republican conference, if they're coming after me now, they will come after you next. That Democrats and the media will not be satisfied just by marginalizing someone like me, that it doesn't end there. It's a version of the sort of cancel culture, slippery slope argument that you hear an awful lot from the right these days. But it's being used in defense of somebody who is, without a doubt, one of the most extreme figures in American politics. And so what do her colleagues ultimately do by the end of this meeting? It's not exactly the same situation as Cheney in that there's not a vote in this meeting. Are we keeping Marjorie Taylor Greene or are we ejecting Marjorie Taylor Greene? It is clear even before the meeting that the Republican

leadership is probably not going to strip her of her committee assignments. But in the aftermath of the meeting, it seems clear enough that Greene gave enough ground to enough of her colleagues that the Republican leadership is not going to feel overwhelming internal pressure to sanction her in a highly public way. So at the end of this meeting, Alex, and in this grand battle between these two avatars of the Republican Party, it's kind of a confusing result, right? I mean, the party does not choose to be one or the other. Like you said earlier, it seems like, in fact, they want to be both. That's right.

They're treated as two separate issues that can be dealt with separately and can be dealt with actually with leniency on both sides, that Liz Cheney wins this vote of confidence. It's a big one for her. It's a big setback for the Matt Gaetz's of the world who wanted to make a very public example of Liz Cheney. But on the other hand, there's no vote on Marjorie Taylor Greene, at least not Wednesday night. Instead, there's a vote the next day. Liberty and justice for all. The chair will entertain up to 15 requests for one-minute speeches on each side of the aisle. It's a very public vote. And it's a vote, by the way, that includes Democrats. It's a vote of the

whole House. Because even before Republicans meet on Wednesday night, Democrats have made it abundantly clear that whether or not the House GOP is going to tolerate this person, they are not going to tolerate her. And Democrats do have the majority in the House. So on Thursday, Democrats bring up a vote of the whole House to strip Greene of her committee assignments. Right. And I watched some of this floor debate and it was very dramatic. It really is. I cannot sit idly by and allow white supremacy and hatred to have decision-making power over our students' futures. And there's a lot of passion and emotion and indignation. We cannot build an equitable anti-racist education system if a seated House Education

and Labor Committee member incites violence through the perpetuation of racist lies in an attempt to overturn an election. Particularly on the Democratic side, where they see her as having made common cause with the mob, with the violent mob that attacked the Capitol. Mr. Speaker, this is a sad day and a difficult day for the House of Representatives and for our country. You see Steny Hoyer, the Democratic majority leader. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues.

Hold up an image. To look at this image. That Greene used in her own campaign that showed her holding an assault rifle. And it's a photoshopped image of her holding an assault rifle next to the faces of left-wing members of the Democratic caucus. And she captioned it, the squad's worst nightmare. People like Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Let us not do nothing, Mr. Speaker.

Let us do the right thing. I yield back the balance of my time. Gentleman yields back the balance of his time. Gentleman from Florida. This culminates in a call of the roll where everybody in the House needs to take a position for or against. Does she keep her committees or does she not? On this vote, the yeas are 230 and the nays are 199. The resolution is adopted. In the end, 11 Republicans vote with all of the Democrats to strip Greene of her committees. So by and large, it ends up being the Democrats in the House who

hold Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene accountable, not really Republicans. That's right. And we'll never know how Republicans might have voted if they had had the chance for a secret ballot on this one, whether there might have been more dissension and more willingness to punish Greene if you didn't have your name attached to it. But it's pretty clear by the end of the day on Thursday that Democrats are very, very determined to punish people who do and say the kinds of extraordinary things that Greene has done and said, and that Republicans do not have the same appetite for doing that. Right. I'm really struck that at the end of this process, House Republicans have privately expressed their support for Liz Cheney in pretty large numbers,

and they have publicly expressed their support for Marjorie Taylor Greene in pretty large numbers. And does that tell us everything that we need to know about the state of the Republican Civil War? Well, it's worth noting here that one of the Republican members who votes in favor of keeping Greene on her committee assignments is Liz Cheney. That you don't have just an all-out war on that element within the Republican Party by exactly the same people who voted to impeach President Trump. But there still is a sort of sense that, you know, you're wearing the same jersey as this member and that Democrats shouldn't be allowed to just exercise the power of the majority to punish someone like that if we, the Republican Party, have not decided to do that ourselves. So even the power of the majority to punish someone like that if we, the Republican Party,

have not decided to do that ourselves. So even the voice of accountability in this civil war ends up refusing to hold the voice of extremism within the Republican Party accountable. It's really a decision on the part of the Republican leadership. And remember, on Thursday, Liz Cheney has been reaffirmed

as a member of the Republican leadership that they're gonna try to hold this rickety coalition together and that they're going to try to include both the most traditional elements in the Republican Party and the most extreme elements in the Republican Party, at least for the duration of the current Congress. When you see 10 members voting to impeach President Trump, 11 members voting to strip Marjorie Taylor Greene of her committee assignments, it's very, very clear that the vast majority of Republicans are not eager to have that kind of all-out battle against an extreme element in their own party at this time. Because they fear what will happen to them at the ballot box. That's absolutely right,

that so many times the conversation about the battle within the Republican Party becomes about, you know, President Trump versus one other person or, you know, Matt Gaetz against Liz Cheney. And the force that we really should talk about here is Republican primary voters, that there is still a broad sense within Republican politics, including at the leadership level in both the House and Senate, that Republican primary voters really like President Trump. And they are really drawn to a version of politics that is totally alien to people who entered Congress more than a couple of years ago. And that the voices of extremism, if they express

themselves in a certain kind of way and on a certain kind of platform, whether it's Facebook or Fox News, they really get the Republican base riled up. And most members of Congress do not want to run headlong into that when they face the voters again in a year. You know, Alex, as we're talking, I'm realizing that while January 6th did cause a kind of temporary flare-up in this civil war we've been discussing and made it impossible for the party to avoid something like these two votes that just occurred in the House, Republicans are actually doing everything in their power to return to the dynamic of the past four years as quickly as possible, right? A dynamic in which they don't confront these divisions. They don't confront extremism head-on. And a dynamic in which they put their heads down once again and hope that this silence, this unwillingness to reject far-right elements of the party, doesn't become a liability with voters or cause more violence. And that in their actions over the past week, they have made the decision not to confront it. Basically, they continue to put off this reckoning and hope that enough Americans are comfortable with a Republican party that

somehow holds space for both Liz Cheney and Marjorie Taylor Greene. That's absolutely right. Well, Alex, thank you very much. Thank you. So the question is, is this still the party of Donald Trump? And does Marjorie Taylor Greene still hold a solid place in that party? Chris, we're the party of Abraham Lincoln. We're the party of Ronald Reagan. We have to really take a hard look at who we are and what we stand for, what we believe

in. On Sunday, in her first television appearance since the effort to oust her from leadership, Liz Cheney made clear that she would not be backing down from her criticisms of former President Trump and cautioned that the Republican Party risked being locked out of power if it did not show a majority of Americans that it could be trusted to lead truthfully. We have to make sure that we are able to convey to the American voters we are the party of responsibility, we are the party of truth, that we actually can be trusted to handle

the challenges this nation faces like COVID, but we should not be embracing the former president. In response, Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted that, quote, Trump is our leader because he put America first and will never back down. Neither will I. back down. Neither will I. Greene predicted that what would lock Republicans out of power is abandoning Trump, and said of Cheney and her supporters, quote, they just don't get it. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. Hundreds of thousands of people marched in cities and towns across Myanmar over the weekend in protest of the military's takeover of the country's government.

The protesters demanded the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, the country's popular civilian leader, who was ousted from power during last week's coup and was sentenced to a years-long prison term. during last week's coup and was sentenced to a years-long prison term. And new research, which analyzed half a million coronavirus tests, has found that the British variant of the virus is spreading rapidly across the U.S., doubling every 10 days. Health experts have warned that the new, more contagious variant could become the predominant version of the virus in the U.S. And the new research confirms that prediction.

Today's episode was produced by Eric Krupke and Jessica Chung. It was edited by Lisa Tobin and Paige Cowett and engineered by Chris Wood. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.