RIPON, WI – As she turns up the quantity on her efforts to court docket disgruntled Republicans in her battle with former President Trump for the White Home, Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday teamed up with essentially the most seen anti-Trump Republican within the city that claims to be the birthplace of the GOP.
Harris campaigned in battleground Wisconsin with former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney, a one-time rising conservative star within the GOP who, within the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol, has vowed to do every part she will be able to to stop Trump from returning to energy.
“I have never voted for a Democrat but this year I am proudly casting my vote for Vice President Kamala Harris,” Cheney informed the viewers, as she formally endorsed the Democratic presidential nominee. “As a conservative, as a patriot, as a mother, as someone who reveres our Constitution, I am honored to join her in this urgent cause.”
Harris praised Cheney as a pacesetter who “puts country above party and above self – a true patriot.”
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The marketing campaign occasion befell in Ripon, Wisconsin, the place a one-room schoolhouse was designated a nationwide historic landmark attributable to its function in holding a collection of conferences in 1854 that led to the formation of the Republican Celebration.
The youthful Cheney was as soon as rising within the ranks of Home Republican management.
However she was essentially the most high-profile of the ten Home Republicans who voted to question then-president Trump in early 2021 on a cost of inciting the lethal Jan. sixth assault on the Capitol, which was waged by right-wing extremists and different Trump supporters who aimed to disrupt congressional certification of President Biden’s Electoral Faculty victory within the 2020 election.
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The conservative lawmaker and protection hawk instantly got here below verbal assault from Trump and his allies, and was finally ousted from her number-three Home GOP management place.
Cheney, who has been vocal in emphasizing the significance of defending the nation’s democratic course of and of placing nation earlier than celebration, was one in every of solely two Republicans who served on a particular choose committee organized by Home Democrats that investigated the riot on the Capitol.
Former Congresswoman Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., speaks at a marketing campaign occasion for Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris at Ripon Faculty in Ripon, Wis., Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024. (AP Picture/Mark Schiefelbein) (AP Picture/Mark Schiefelbein)
In 2022, she was ousted within the GOP congressional major in Wyoming by a candidate that was backed by Trump.
At a talking occasion in early September at Duke College in swing state North Carolina, Cheney introduced that she could be voting for Harris within the presidential election. Cheney’s father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, additionally endorsed Harris.
Cheney on Thursday warned that “our republic faces a threat unlike any we have faced before. A former president who attempted to stay in power by unraveling the foundations of our republic.
She argued that Trump “can by no means be trusted with energy once more” and emphasized that “on this election, placing patriotism forward of partisanship just isn’t an aspiration, it’s our responsibility.”
“What Jan. 6 reveals us is there’s not an oz., not an oz., of compassion in Donald Trump. He’s petty. He’s vindictive. He’s merciless. And Donald Trump just isn’t match to steer this good and nice nation,” Cheney claimed.
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Harris, talking after Cheney, highlighted that “anybody who recklessly tramples on our democratic values as Donald Trump has, anybody who has actively and violently obstructed the desire of the folks and the peaceable switch of energy, as Donald Trump has….mustn’t ever once more stand behind the seal of the President of the USA.”
And Harris emphasised that “I take critically my pledge to be a president for all People.
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris, left, arrives to talk at a marketing campaign occasion with former Congresswoman Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., proper, at Ripon Faculty in Ripon, Wis., Thursday, Oct. 3, 2024. (AP Picture/Mark Schiefelbein) (AP Picture/Mark Schiefelbein)
Cheney was not all the time a fan of Harris.
The Trump marketing campaign on Thursday repeatedly pointed to a social media publish by Cheney throughout the 2000 election the place she argued that “@KamalaHarris has a more liberal voting record than Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Her radical leftist views-raising taxes, banning gun sales, taxpayer $ for abortion & illegal immigrant health care, eliminating private health insurance-would be devastating for America.”
Trump, talking with Fox Information’ Invoice Melugin throughout a rally in Michigan on Thursday, mentioned that Cheney was “terrible” and “a stupid warhawk. All she wants to do is shoot missiles at people.”
On Cheney’s backing of Harris, Trump argued “I think they hurt each other. I think they’re so bad, both of them.”
The Cheneys are a part of a rising checklist of distinguished Republicans who’re supporting Harris.
Two different high-profile anti-Trump Republicans — former Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois and former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan – had talking roles on the Democratic Nationwide Conference, which was held six weeks in the past in Chicago.
Former Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois speaks on the Democratic Nationwide Conference, on Aug. 22, 2024 in Chicago, Illinois (Paul Steinhauser – Fox Information )
And Harris is backed by greater than 200 alumni who served in each Bush administrations or labored for the late Sen. John McCain and Sen. Mitt Romney, the 2008 and 2012 GOP presidential nominee. She’s additionally supported by greater than 100 Republican former nationwide safety officers and different distinguished Republicans.
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Ripon just isn’t the one city that claims to be the birthplace of the GOP. Exeter, New Hampshire additionally has some bragging rites, because it was the location of conferences in 1853 – a 12 months forward of the Ripon gatherings – by disenchanted political leaders who mentioned the formation of a brand new celebration of Republicans.
However officers in Ripon mentioned the group in Exeter by no means really shaped a political group, or selected officers, as they did in Wisconsin.
Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, campaigns with former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney in Ripon, Wisconsin, the birthplace of the GOP, at an occasion on Oct. 3, 2024 (Fox Information – Paul Steinhauser)
Wisconsin is one in every of seven essential battleground states with razor-thin margins that determined Biden’s 2020 White Home victory and are more likely to decide if Harris or Trump wins the 2024 presidential election.
With lower than 5 weeks till Election Day in November, Harris and Trump are locked in a margin-of-error race in the important thing swing states.
Whereas Trump retains huge sway over the GOP, even a small sliver of Republicans supporting Harris might make an necessary influence in what is going to possible be a race throughout the margins within the battleground states.
