Larry Hogan: Ousting Liz Cheney was a mistake

Removing Rep. Liz Cheney from her role as the House's No. 3 Republican is "kind of doubling down on failure," Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan said Sunday morning.

"I think it was a mistake," Hogan said on CNN's "State of the Union." "Liz Cheney is a solid conservative Republican who voted with the president 93 percent of the time. I thought she just stood up and told the truth and said exactly what she thought.

"To ostracize somebody or remove them from their leadership position, it's crazy," the Maryland Republican added. "I mean, it's kind of doubling down on failure. We've lost the White House, the House, the Senate over the past four years, and to continue to do the exact same thing and expect a different result is the definition of insanity."

Cheney was ousted from Republican House leadership last week after publicly rejecting former President Donald Trump's theories about a rigged election. New York Rep. Elise Stefanik — who has vocally supported Trump and his election theories — easily secured the spot after garnering support from top party leaders and Trump himself.

But Hogan said that Trump's continued role in the GOP is problematic — echoing Cheney's assertions that Trump poses an "ongoing threat" to democracy.

"I think he's toxic for the Republican Party and for the country," he said. "And I think we've got to find a way to get the Republican Party back to the party of Lincoln and Reagan and get back to the traditional big tent party that can appeal to the majority of people. Otherwise, we simply aren't going to have control, we're not going to get the White House back and we won't have control of the House and the Senate."

And Hogan wasn't the only lawmaker speaking out on Sunday against Trump's role in the GOP.

Speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press," Rep. Adam Kinzinger went so far as to say that for some Republicans, loyalty to Trump matters more than actual policy.

"To any Republican that's maybe confused by the moment we're in is: Policy doesn't matter anymore. It literally is all your loyalty to Donald Trump," the Illinois Republican said. "As I said before, this is something that echoes a little bit out of North Korea where, no matter what policy comes out, you're loyal to the guy."

He went on to say: "I had so many people that said, 'I don't like what Donald Trump tweets, but I like his policies so I'm going to support him.' Liz Cheney, everybody's saying, 'I like her policies, I don't like her tweets, so she needs to leave.' What that shows me is an inconsistency that is built solely around an allegiance to one man, Donald Trump."

Other Republicans have argued that it's time to just move on.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) said that Cheney's ouster had less to do with her opposition to Trump and more to do with the need for the GOP to move past the debate entirely.

"I think what [House Minority Leader] Kevin McCarthy was trying to say there was, 'Look, there is disagreement, and it's time to move on. We can keep having that fight if we'd like. But what is the point? What is the outcome? When in reality, we need to be talking about the things that American people actually care about.'"

Speaking to NBC's Chuck Todd, Crenshaw said that the internal drama of the Republican Party is not what's important to the American people — and that lawmakers need to instead turn their attention to matters like energy infrastructure, hiring and unemployment, the border and immigration or the conflict in the Middle East.