Kinzinger says Cheney's House leadership position is threatened because she's making it 'uncomfortable' for other Republicans over election lie

During an interview with the National Press Club, Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., said Wednesday’s vote on whether Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., will remain as the House Republican Conference chair is taking place because she is making things “uncomfortable” for Republican members who don’t want to admit that President Biden won the 2020 election.

Video Transcript

EMILY WILKINS: And I do want to take a step back. I imagine most people who are watching this right now, they understand what's about to happen two days from now, on Wednesday. But just a quick recap. On Wednesday, the House Republican conference, they're going to meet, and they are expected to vote to remove Congresswoman Liz Cheney, who is the caucus chair, the number third Republican in the house, from her position. And that is because, again and again, Congresswoman Cheney has come and pushed back against Trump when Trump claims that the 2020 election, that he should have won it and that it was rigged.

Cheney has been a very loud voice, Cheney has-- as well as yourself, Congressman-- in pushing back against that, saying, no, that's not true. Even though Liz Cheney is very conservative, she's actually likely to be replaced by Congresswoman Elise Stefanik, who, voting-wise, has a more moderate record, but who has been a very vocal supporter of President Trump.

And so, Congressman, I want to sort of loop back and ask you, there was a very similar vote on Cheney that was taken back in February. And she won that, with 2/3 of the support from the Republican conference. What has changed in those last two months? When you speak to your colleagues, what's the reason they give you for why they want to remove Cheney from her current post?

ADAM KINZINGER: Because Cheney is making it uncomfortable for them. If you want to hide because you don't want to tick off the base and tell the truth about January 6, you don't want to have to admit that Joe Biden won an election, Cheney makes it uncomfortable for you because when she's asked about it, she doesn't dance around. She just says the election wasn't stolen, Biden was president, right, and January 6 was a Trump-inspired insurrection. And so, that now gins up your local media again. You're going to have to answer that. And she's made it uncomfortable.

And it's a really compelling argument to say, as, a party we just have to move on. We have to unite. Right? But this is four months ago.

And it's not like we have a disagreement in policy. It's not like we're sitting here, one side's arguing the top tax rate should be 32, the other 31, and we just need to move on, like, unite and move on. This is lies versus truth. This is, the election was stolen and therefore a third of America believes that democracy fails-- and that leads to violence, by the way, in the long term-- versus the truth.

It's amazing how many of my colleagues claim to likewise be Christians, but somehow are OK with, like, just accepting and supporting these lies. Because, I mean, when I went to Sunday school, it was always about telling the truth. And I read nothing in the words of the New Testament about, you know, that you can lie as long as the end state's right, as long as it's against abortion or against the left.

And so, look, I think when it comes down to it, that's Liz Cheney's-- what she is being removed for-- is making it uncomfortable and being consistent. And God bless her for having the consistency to tell the truth, because history, I'm going to tell you, in the long term, is going to write very well about her. And people are going to have to stand up and do the right thing.

The last thing I'll say is this. The one person continually bringing all this back up is not Liz Cheney. It's Donald Trump. Donald Trump was out of power after January 6, and then Kevin McCarthy went down, probably with Scalise, and put the paddles on him and resurrected him politically back to life.

And then he's the one that tweets something yesterday about horse-doping. And then, all this weird-- He doesn't tweet anymore, I guess sends out a press release. He's the one that keeps talking about the big "Biden stole an election." He's the one that isn't unifying.

But of course, he's out of power. He's a loser. But he's the one that a lot of people fear.