Schumer: Cheney ouster ‘very dark moment’ for GOP

Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Wednesday criticized House Republicans shortly after they voted to oust Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) from her leadership post.

Schumer, speaking from the Senate floor, said he and Cheney disagreed on policy but that she “had the courage to tell the truth and paid a big price for it.”

“This is sad, a very dark moment for the Republican Party. Republicans are seeking to perpetuate and act upon the big lie that the election was stolen simply to placate the most dishonest president in American history,” Schumer said.

Cheney, who served as the House Republican Conference Chairwoman, was one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach former President Trump earlier this year. But while many of those Republicans have gone quiet in their day-to-day criticism of Trump’s false claim that the 2020 election was “stolen,” Cheney hasn’t shied away from publicly pushing back.

That’s sparked broad frustration from House Republicans, including Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who was critical of Trump in the immediate wake of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by a violent mob of the former president’s supporters.

Schumer’s comments from the Senate floor come a day after he lashed out at House Republicans during a committee hearing on a sweeping bill to overhaul federal elections.

“Unfortunately, the big lie is spreading like a cancer among Republicans. It’s enveloping and consuming the Republican Party, in both houses of Congress,” Schumer said at the hearing.

Democrats view the For the People Act as a top priority to counteract hundreds of bills that have been filed in state legislatures across the country that would place restrictions on voting.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) knocked the Democratic bill on Wednesday as a “one-party takeover of our political system.”

“It will shatter public confidence in our democracy if the Democratic Party decides it can rig the rules,” McConnell said.