In an op-ed published at The Wall Street Journal this Wednesday, former Wyoming GOP Rep. Liz Cheney says that the checks and balances provided by the U.S. Constitution will not be enough to stop Donald Trump and his authoritarian ways, and Republicans who think those checks and balances will protect from illegal or unconstitutional acts are deluding themselves.
"Republican senators such as Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz, and J.D. Vance have shown that they won’t step forward to check Mr. Trump’s power," Cheney writes. "Even Sen. Mike Lee, who explicitly agreed on Jan. 6 that Mr. Trump’s plan to seize power was unconstitutional, now pushes crackpot conspiracy theories about the nature of the attack."
According to Cheney, House Republicans are more unreliable, since some of them participated in Trump's Jan. 6 plans, while others are too worried about losing primaries or actual physical violence "to stand up and stop him."
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"Although Congress could check Mr. Trump’s power by impeaching, convicting and removing him, this would require sufficient Republican cooperation to reach the required two-thirds supermajority in the Senate," she writes. "Given recent history, it would be foolish to expect Republicans to impeach and convict in a second term, no matter what Mr. Trump does."
The courts could also offer a buffer against Trump, but he has "ignored judicial rulings in dozens of cases rejecting his stolen-election claims, including several rulings by federal judges he appointed," she writes.
Cheney goes on to contend that Trump is "the same exceptionally dangerous and flawed man today" as he was on the insurrection of Jan. 6.
Read the full op-ed at The Wall Street Journal.
