President Joe Biden's decision Thursday to award former Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., with the second-highest honor a president can bestow has angered pro-Trump Republicans, who have long accused the conservative lawmaker and frequent critic of President-elect Donald Trump as a traitor to the party.
In granting the Presidential Citizens Medal to Cheney and Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., Biden acknowledged their role in leading the House investigation into Trump's involvement in the Jan. 6 insurrection. The committee disbanded after unanimously voting in December 2022 to refer Trump for prosecution.
Trump and his allies have said that they and other members of the panel should be jailed for their efforts, with Cheney earning particular condemnation from that corner of the political world due largely to her prominence in the GOP. Then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., booted her from the party leadership in 2021, and in 2022 she lost her seat against a primary challenger.
Cheney's latest return to the spotlight provoked a fresh round of outrage, with her home-state colleague and No. 2 Senate Republican John Barrasso, R-Wyo., declaring in a statement that Biden “was either going to pardon Liz Cheney or give her an award. She doesn’t deserve either. She represents partisanship and divisiveness — not Wyoming.”
Fox News joined in the broadside Thursday night. Frequent network contributor and former Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told guests on a segment of Hannity he was hosting that he was "offended" by Cheney's receipt of the award.
"I don’t know how you feel, but I was offended that President Biden gave the second-highest medal of honor— it’s not called the Medal of Honor, but a medal honoring these two congressmen... Liz Cheney and Bennie Thompson. What’s your reaction to that?” he asked one of his guests, Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Florida.
We need your help to stay independent
“My reaction is I’m highly offended, but I’m not surprised,” Donalds responded. “Joe Biden and his White House have lived in the bizarro land where no Americans really exist. That’s why the presidency under Joe Biden has been an abject disaster. This is just one of the last pieces of icing on that cake.”
Donalds added that the "fake" Jan. 6 committee's only purpose was to "put a lot of propaganda out into the information stream to go after and attack Donald Trump."
Donalds' fellow panelist, House Oversight Committee chair James Comer, R-Ky., quickly concurred. “It’s a slap in the face to all the good Americans who actually deserve to be recognized for their public service or for their sacrifice or for their community activism,” he said, before criticizing Biden for supposedly snubbing first responders, soldiers and humanitarians.
In addition to Cheney and Thompson, 18 other honorees were recognized at the Thursday ceremony, including a military doctor who improved battlefield trauma care and a civil rights leader who fought for desegregation.
Shares