The Liz Cheney interview on NBC was less an interview and more a Rorschach test for the most irrational anxieties and overthinking tendencies of political junkies who spend way too much time online. The Republican congresswoman from Wyoming just lost a primary that was conducted solely on the question of whether fascist insurrections are good or bad. (Cheney is Team Anti-Insurrection.) In her post-loss interview with Savannah Guthrie, the Beltway's favorite speculative question came up: Is Liz Cheney going to run for president now?
"I will be doing whatever it takes to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office," Cheney replied, adding that running for president "is something I'm thinking about and I'll make a decision in the coming months."
Needless to say, the online chatter reached "sticking your head in a beehive" levels. A lot of folks mistake Cheney for a moron contemplating a third-party run that would siphon votes from President Joe Biden in a rematch against Trump in 2024. Others appear to believe she's delusional enough to think she could win a GOP primary, despite the fact that her work with the January 6 committee has shown her to be perhaps the least delusional politician in her party. There's a lot of resistance to accepting that Cheney is who she presents as: A right-wing Republican from a political dynasty that has been well-served by the current system, and who therefore doesn't want to see it replaced by a fascist dictatorship run by a reality TV host.
But this one really is a no-brainer. If Trump runs in 2024, Cheney should absolutely run in the Republican primary against him. In fact, many Democratic voters should contemplate temporarily switching their registration that election cycle just so they can vote for her in the Republican primary. I know I'm making just such a calculation.
In what is likely to be a close race, Cheney could be a game changer.
Now, now put down your keyboard for a second and hear me out before you fire off an irate email or tweet. (Though many never got past the headline and are already there.) I'm not saying vote for Cheney in the general election. Nor do I think she will win a Republican primary against Trump. No, my thinking here is that if enough Democrats cross the aisle to keep Cheney in the race — complete with TV interviews and Republican debates — she is going to make life much harder for Trump. Just as importantly, she'll make it a lot harder for other Republicans who might otherwise be tempted to ignore what a monster he is in order to vote for him.
Trump is a unique figure in American politics, but that doesn't mean the normal rules of politics don't impact him. One of those general rules is that bruising primary seasons hurt a nominee in a general election. Because a contentious primary means that criticism of the candidate is coming from inside the house, it can drive down turnout or turn normally loyal partisans to third parties. We saw that in 2016. Both Trump and the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, were nominated after a grinding primary battle. Both subsequently underperformed compared to their 2012 predecessors. Clinton got 48.2% of the vote compared to Barack Obama's 51.1% in 2012. Trump got 46.1% of the vote compared to Mitt Romney's 47.2%. Her protracted primary fight almost certainly cost Clinton the election.
Most Republican voters, of course, love that Trump is a corrupt, fascist criminal. Still, a small but significant portion of them harbor doubts. They can only support him by telling themselves a story about how the January 6 insurrection was no big deal. But having Cheney in the 2024 primary, repeatedly telling her fellow Republicans the truth from the Republican debate stage, could penetrate the bubble those folks are living in. She's already doing it. About 10% of Republicans think Trump should be prosecuted for the attempted coup, a number that would likely be closer to zero if they weren't getting the message from a Republican. That small percentage could be convinced to sit out the 2024 election, or maybe even vote for Biden. In what is likely to be a close race, Cheney could be a game changer.
Keeping her in the mix, however, means making sure she has enough votes in the primary that it's hard to ignore her. That's where Democratic voters can help. It's likely that Biden is going to run uncontested in 2024, which means a lot of Democratic voters were going to sit out the primary anyway. Instead of doing that, why not just switch their registration — for that year and that year only — so they can help run up Cheney's vote total and keep her in the race longer?
You don't have to love her. You don't have to like her. But we can use Liz Cheney in 2024.
Obviously, there are a ton of caveats. Only do this if it's easy to switch back and forth, or if your state has open primaries. Don't skip out on Democratic primaries that you care about, where your vote can make a huge difference, to do this. And only do this — crucially — if Donald Trump is actually running. We still have a chance that prison or God (with an assist from McDonald's) takes him out between now and then, which would make this discussion moot.
Alas, there are a lot of left-leaning voters who relate to voting like they're picking which Garanimal they want to wear to daycare, as if it's a matter of self-expression instead of political strategy. It's an attitude that causes ostensible adults to say things like this tweet, from an editor at Aeon (!):
John Fetterman talks about class, so liberals don't like him. Liz Cheney likes proceduralism so liberals love her. This is the problem, not some arcane ideas of the right-wing that need to be excavated.
— Sam Haselby (@samhaselby) August 18, 2022
Briefly aligning yourself with someone you disagree with for strategic purposes is not the same thing as being in love. (Also, as his fundraising numbers show, liberals are indeed in love with John Fetterman.) As Talking Points Memo founder Josh Marshall noted in his response, "I can say someone I disagree with is courageous. I can say someone I hate is courageous. Honestly, I say it and then just go about my day."
This is where Republican voters tend to be more pragmatic, seeing voting less as self-expression and more as a tool you wield to get and keep power. How else do you think someone as repugnant as Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas keeps winning? Even Trump is a beneficiary of this, as a substantial number of his own voters think he's gross yet back him anyway because they want their own party to win.
Because of this utilitarian approach to politics, it's common for Republicans to play this game of voting in Democratic primaries to manipulate the general election in favor of the Republican. My Republican relatives, for instance, frequently use open primaries to vote in Democratic primaries for candidates they think are likelier to lose in the general. It's so out of control that, in some places like West Virginia, up to a third of Democratic primary voters are actually Republicans.
Democrats should give as good as we get, and, when appropriate, play the same games with Republican primaries. There will never be a better chance than an election where the Democrat is running unchallenged, but the Republican frontrunner is a fascist who attempted a coup. On our own, we can't crack through the Republican wall of defensiveness about Trump. But Cheney, being a member of their tribe, does have the power to rattle the conscience of a small percentage of them.
You don't have to love her. You don't have to like her. But we can use Liz Cheney in 2024 to throw a wrench in Trump's plan to glide seamlessly to the nomination, and from there, win (or likelier, steal) the White House. When facing a threat like Trump, it's important to use every tool we have in the toolbox to beat him.
