After her primary election defeat to Harriet Hageman Tuesday evening, Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney compared herself to former President Abraham Lincoln in her speech.
“The great and original champion of our party, Abraham Lincoln, was defeated in elections for the Senate and the House before he won the most important election of all,” Cheney said while speaking in Jackson, Wyoming.
“Lincoln ultimately prevailed, he saved our union, and he defined our obligation as Americans for all of history,” she added.
Many took Cheney’s speech as a hint that her political career is not over yet. Rumors have been swirling that she may run for president in 2024.
A large portion of her speech was spent attacking former President Donald Trump, specifically over the 2020 election results.
Trump took to Truth Social to congratulate “Harriet Hageman on her great and very decisive WIN in Wyoming.”
“This is a wonderful result for America, and a complete rebuke of the Unselect Committee of political Hacks and Thugs,” he said.
“Liz Cheney should be ashamed of herself, the way she acted, and her spiteful, sanctimonious words and actions towards others,” Trump continued. “Now she can finally disappear into the depths of political oblivion where, I am sure, she will be much happier than she is right now.”
Hours later, he commented on Cheney’s concession speech.
“Liz Cheney’s uninspiring concession speech, in front of a ‘tiny’ crowd in the Great State of Wyoming, focused on her belief that the 2020 Presidential Election was not, despite massive and conclusive evidence to the contrary, Rigged & Stolen,” he said.
Trump added that “Liz Cheney is a fool who played right into the hands of those who want to destroy our Country!”
During an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham, Hageman said that while she hasn’t spoken to Cheney since her defeat, she “wasn’t surprised” that Cheney focused on her “obsession about President Trump.”
“It doesn’t surprise me that she would revert to those same old talking points, because that’s really in large part what got her defeated,” she said. “She is not focusing on Wyoming.”