House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said Thursday that he was in favor of House GOP Conference Chairwoman Liz Cheney (R-WY), who has been facing calls to resign from her leadership position after she voted to impeach Trump, staying at her post.
McCarthy emphasized that differences of opinion are a welcome aspect of the Republican Party and then suggested that differences stemming from the impeachment vote would be discussed in an upcoming conference call with the Republican members of Congress.
“This is the same leadership team, with the ranking members and others, that came five seats away from winning a majority when everybody in America thought we were going to lose twenty seats,” said the House minority leader.
McCarthy added: “We allow differences of opinion inside our conference. They’re welcomed. But I think there’s questions that need to be answered, style in which things were delivered. At the end of the day, we will unify because our policies are right, which will unify [us around]. Do we have growing pains? Yes we will. But we will do it in our private manner of a conference that we hold every time, and we’ll have it next week.”
According to The Hill, more than half the members of the House Republican Conference have signed onto a petition calling on Cheney to resign as conference chair, which is the third-highest ranking Republican position in the House.
Before the impeachment vote, Cheney said in a statement that “there has never been a greater betrayal by a President of the United States of his office and his oath to the Constitution” than Trump’s actions prior to and during the attack on the Capitol building. Nine other Republican members of Congress voted to impeach the president as well.
Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, said Thursday that she welcomed conference discussions on the topic.
“We have differences of opinion about a whole range of issues, including about this one,” Cheney told Fox News, reports The Wall Street Journal. “And I anticipate and am confident that we will be united as a conference going forward.”
Cheney has also already garnered a 2022 primary challenge back in Wyoming, where State Senator Anthony Bouchard will run against her in a bid for Wyoming’s only congressional seat.
“Liz Cheney’s long-time opposition to President Trump and her most recent vote for impeachment shows just how out of touch she is with Wyoming,” said Bouchard, reports The Casper Star-Tribune. “Wyoming taxpayers need a voice in Congress who will stand up to Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats, and not give them cover. That’s why I’m running for Congress.”
While she did not speak on the House floor during the impeachment debate, Cheney told a reporter after the vote that she wasn’t planning on going anywhere, reports the news agency. She was first elected to Congress in 2017 and became GOP Conference Chair in 2019.