Liz Cheney Loses Her Primary

As expected, Liz Cheney lost her primary Tuesday in Wyoming. The congresswoman lost to Harriet Hageman, who was backed by former President Trump—who was, as NBC News puts it, seeking "revenge" on Cheney for voting to impeach him when he was president, as well as for sitting on the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the US Capitol by his supporters. Insider calls this the former president's "biggest primary victory" yet. Cheney conceded the race in a speech to supporters Tuesday night and said she'd already called Hageman, whom Trump praised in his own message before it turned nasty toward Cheney, whom he said could now "finally disappear into the depths of political oblivion."

That was not, however, what she sounded like she planned to do in her own speech, in which she pointed out that two years ago she won her primary with more than 70% of the vote and could have seen a similar result this year if she'd gone along with Trump's false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. (As of this posting, Cheney had 34% of the vote to Hageman's 62%.) "This primary election is over,” she said. “But now the real work begins.” She said she would continue to fight Trump: "We must be very clear-eyed about the threat we face,” she said, and “do whatever it takes to ensure that Donald Trump is never again anywhere near the Oval Office." (More Liz Cheney stories.)