Liz Cheney‘s new book is a scathing portrait of Republican “enablers and collaborators” who are responsible for the continued hold that Donald Trump has on the party, CNN reported on Tuesday.
With Cheney’s Oath and Honor set to be published next week, CNN Jamie Gangel obtained an advance copy and described it as an “unflinching” look at her former GOP colleagues. Cheney was ousted from Republican leadership as she continued to criticize Trump in the aftermath of the January 6th attack on the Capitol.
“You get personal conversations, Republican meetings,” Gangel said on Jake Tapper’s The Lead, adding that Cheney recounts being on a Trump surrogates call on Jan. 4, 2021 in which she hears “the stark specific planning” for January 6th.
On that date, before the attack on the Capitol, Cheney recounts being in the GOP House cloakroom and members were asked to sign on to electoral vote objection sheets. Many members knew that it was a “farce,” and one member, Rep. Mark Green (R-TN) signed his name and said, to no one in particular, The things we do for the Orange Jesus,” Cheney wrote.
Cheney also wrote that two days after the election, Kevin McCarthy, then the House GOP leader, told her that he talked to Trump and that “he knows it’s over. He needs to go through all the stages of grief.” Cheney also wrote that she had an exchange with Mike Johnson, then a relatively unknown congressman from Louisiana, about his pressuring of members to sign on to a legal brief arguing that election results from four states Joe Biden won should be thrown out.
“When I confronted him about flaws in his legal arguments, Johnson would often concede or say something to the effect of, ‘We just need to do this one last thing for Trump,’” Cheney wrote, per CNN.
Johnson was elected House speaker in October, succeeding McCarthy after his ouster. The new speaker has since endorsed Trump in the 2024 race.
Cheney lost the Republican primary last year in her reelection bid, as McCarthy and other Republicans campaigned for her opponent. By that time, Cheney had taken a spot on the January 6th Committee as vice chair, one of only two GOP members along with Adam Kinzinger.
In the book, Cheney also recalled how some Republicans mocked McCarthy for his trip to Mar-a-Lago in the weeks following the attack on the Capitol and after Trump had left the presidency. She wrote that she confronted McCarthy about the visit, which was a first step toward restoring Trump’s popularity within the Republican party.
McCarthy, Cheney wrote, told her that he visited because Trump’s team was “really worried” about him. “Trump’s not eating, so they asked me to come see him,” McCarthy said.
But some Republicans were upset about McCarthy’s visit, and circulated a text that featured a photo of McCarthy and Trump along with the clip from Jerry Maguire, when Tom Cruise’s title character tells Renee Zellweger’s Dorothy Boyd, “You complete me.”
In the book, Cheney refers to Trump as “the most dangerous man ever to inhabit the Oval Office,” and writes, “we cannot survive a president willing to terminate our Constitution.”
In a statement, Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said, “Liz Cheney is a loser who is now lying in order to sell a book that either belongs in the discount bargain bin in the fiction section of the bookstore or should be repurposed as toilet paper. These are nothing more than completely fabricated stories because President Trump is the clear frontrunner to be the Republican nominee and the strongest candidate to beat Crooked Joe Biden. Liz clearly suffers from Trump Derangement Syndrome and needs to address the underlying issues in her own personal life.”
Spokespersons for Green and McCarthy did not immediately return a request for comment.