Rekha Basu: Liz Cheney defeat again shows Republicans choosing devotion to Trump over truth

Congresswoman Liz Cheney stood outside, against a rustic Wyoming backdrop after losing her Republican primary race Tuesday evening, and told the press and supporters what she had just done: called her opponent and conceded.

Cheney, the latest Republican incumbent to fall victim to the wrath of unconditional Donald Trump backers, told the crowd, "Tonight, Harriet Hageman received the most votes in this primary. The primary race is over..."

That simple, courteous act of acknowledgment from the losing side, long a staple in U.S. elections, puts commitment to the democratic process ahead of personal ambition and ego. Yet it is an act that Trump, two years after losing his presidential re-election bid, still can't bring himself to perform with Joe Biden.

He won't acknowledge that Biden won 306 electoral votes to his own 232, or 81,268,924 popular votes to Trump's 74,216,154. All counts and evidence to the contrary, he continues to mouth the lie that he, Trump, was robbed of his rightful win, after various election officials and the vice president refused to "find" him enough votes to declare him the victor. And he uses his continuing clout to undermine anyone who dares question him.

Hageman, his choice over Cheney, supported Trump's claim that the election was stolen. "The people of Wyoming deserve leaders who reflect their views and values, but Liz Cheney betrayed us because of her personal war with President Trump," Hagerman declared during the campaign.

That's even though Cheney voted with Trump nearly 93% of his time in office before becoming vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee, which has shared overwhelming evidence of Trump's role in the Jan. 6 insurrection after the election.

Some who carried out Trump's dirty work Jan. 6 are now serving sentences for it. Most Republicans either forgave Trump for unleashing an unruly mob on the Capitol with lethal consequences, refused to believe he could have done it, or didn't, and don't care. So it was Cheney who became Public Enemy #1 with the GOP, for helping get to the bottom of it..

None of this makes rational sense. The Republican standing up for truth and the rule of law gets clobbered while the offender's numbers go up. Cheney was one of 10 Republican members of Congress who voted to impeach Trump in 2021 for his role in inciting the mob. But only two went on to win their primaries for re-election, one from Washington state and the other from California. The rest, some targeted by hatred and death threats, retired, dropped out or lost.

And most Republican voters still support Trump, judging by a new Morning Consult/Politico poll showing 71% think he should run again in 2024. So they've either forgiven him, swallowed the lie or don't much care about it.

More: Now we've seen what can happen, even here, when a demagogue has free rein

This all raises a critical question about what Republican values mean these days, and how people who call themselves Republicans can square them with the man they still defer to as head of the party.

I would contend that being a Republican used to mean fiscal conservatism, as defined by low taxes and less government spending (except on the military), and a foreign policy focused on beating back real or perceived communist threats, or clearing the way for U.S. capitalist investment. Eventually it expanded to social conservatism on "traditional" marriage, opposition to abortion or LGBTQ civil rights.

Those conservative values would hardly point to a thrice-married, crotch-grabbing businessman with no military service or defined religious affiliation. Yet people project onto Trump what they want to see: 59% of white evangelical Protestant Republicans said in 2020 that he had strong religious beliefs, according to the nonprofit Public Religion Research Institute's American Values Survey.

Attendees at a Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando in March blasted Russia's leader, Vladimir Putin, and his actions against Ukraine. Yet no one faulted Trump's cozy relationship with him.

And in the new Morning Consult/Politico poll, conducted Aug. 10, after the FBI raid on Trump's Mar-a-Lago home, 58% of Republicans say they would still vote for him. That's up 4% in a month, suggesting that every time Trump faces new legal or political problems and responds by claiming persecution, his popularity rises.

Related: 'Can I count on you?' Trump revs up fundraising pitches after FBI's Mar-a-Lago search

He has called the FBI’s search “political persecution” and a “witch hunt” designed to harm the political movement he leads. And 69% of Republican voters agree with him that politics motivated the search (compared with 39% of all voters), according to the Morning Consult/Politico poll. Will they continue to feel that way as people close to the former president plead guilty to crimes while he was in office?

Is it fear that makes him so impermeable to criticism? We've all seen how he can shame and ridicule those he opposes. Are followers so thin skinned they'll say yes to anything he wants to avoid it? Iowa's senior senator, Chuck Grassley, who was once respected as an independent thinker, stuck with Trump rather than vote to convict him for abuse of power and obstruction of justice. And once Trump was out of office spewing election-related conspiracies, Grassley appeared on stage with him in Des Moines to accept his endorsement. “If I didn’t accept the endorsement of a person that’s got 91% of the Republican voters in Iowa, I wouldn’t be too smart," said Grassley. "I’m smart enough to accept that endorsement.”

More: Former President Donald Trump endorses Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley: 'A great American patriot'

So it's just blind opportunism? Democracy be damned? As for those 91% of Iowa Republican voters: What are you thinking?

Some leaders lead with reassurance or dreams of a better future. Trump plays on fear. His latest logo, "Save America," suggests a threat, from foreign or internal forces or both. Based on his past actions and rhetoric in office, that would be from some combination of immigrants, people of color, and gay and transgender people. He has championed Hageman's stands on border enforcement, crime, gun rights and, ironically, "election integrity," and he gets away with saying it.

Then again, when 81% of Republicans in the Public Religion Research Institute's poll said the Democratic Party has been taken over by socialists, and 90% believe the Republican Party is trying to protect America against outside threats, they clearly respond to fear-mongering.

Among Democrats, on the other hand, 78% think the Republican Party has been taken over by racists.

Now some liberals are in a conundrum over how to feel about Cheney. While they've applauded her integrity and courage in breaking from the Republican majority to hold Trump accountable, they break with her political priorities, which have been pretty far to the right. She supported Trump in voting against extending housing assistance in response to the COVID pandemic, against expanding the Affordable Care Act, against a bill to combat brutality and racial discrimination by police, against a bill restricting Trump from taking military action against Iran without congressional approval. She voted not to let the federal government negotiate lower prescription drug prices. She opposed restoring parts of the Voting Rights Act. She even opposed disaster aid for Puerto Rico.

Hopefully she's had a change of heart on some of those.

Also, Cheney has a gay sister, Mary Cheney, who is married and has children, yet Liz publicly opposed same-sex marriage in 2013, while campaigning against then-Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming. She lost that race anyway, and her stance led to a public rift with Mary. But last year Liz told CBS's "60 Minutes" that she was wrong and regretted that stance, and Mary applauded her. "That is something few politicians would ever do," she said. "I have nothing but respect and admiration for the strength of character she continues to show on a daily basis."

To Liz, she added, "I told you so."

I can't help thinking that having gone against her values and family once for political gain, Liz Cheney has learned not to make the same mistake again but to stand up for what is right going forward. I believe her eyes have been opened in other ways to how dirty politics can get: She was stripped of her role as chair of the Republican conference and censured by the Republican National Committee for joining the Jan. 6 committee.

Personally, I'd love to see her not only take on Trump in a presidential primary, as she has hinted she might, but challenge the entire Republican establishment that chose to sacrifice her to kowtow to Trump while suppressing the truth about his role in Jan. 6. Now that would be a race worth watching.

Rekha Basu is an opinion columnist for The Des Moines Register. Contact: rbasu@dmreg.com. Follow her on Twitter @RekhaBasu and at Facebook.com/rekha.basu1106. Her book, "Finding Her Voice: A collection of Des Moines Register columns about women's struggles and triumphs in the Midwest," is available at ShopDMRegister.com/FindingHerVoice.

Want more opinions? Read other perspectives with our free newsletter, follow us on Facebook or visit us at DesMoinesRegister.com/Opinion. Respond to any opinion by submitting a Letter to the Editor at DesMoinesRegister.com/Letters.

Real perspective, brought to you by real Iowans. Subscribe today to support local journalism.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Opinion: Republicans keep choosing devotion to Trump over truth