It was still early on Tuesday night when it became apparent that Liz Cheney had not only lost the Wyoming primary but was obliterated. Despite gaining a significant number of Democrat crossover votes, Cheney lost by nearly 40 points to Harriet Hageman.
The excuses were made shortly thereafter. In the eyes of media outlets and Cheney herself, the loss was entirely due to her inability to claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. This was countered by Brian Kemp's huge primary victory in Georgia. In truth, Cheney lost because she was completely uninterested in her constituents and focused instead on January 6th and Donald Trump. It is apparent that since the election, Cheney and her supporters have learned nothing.
Hageman stated on Sean Hannity's program that Cheney, who was defeated in the election of Wyoming, had left her a brief message that did not contain the word concession. Cheney's campaign quickly went to the media to declare that the claim was a sham, and the usual suspects believed it.
The story is that Hageman stated that she got a “two-second” voicemail from Cheney that didn't mention conceding. In a moment of anger that followed, the Cheney camp rushed to send an audio recording to Politico which was supposedly the voicemail. It included an offer of concession. The incident prompted Stephen Hayes, who was eager to have his previous statements confirmed, to go on a rant about the fact that Hageman lied and was just looking for “MAGApplause.”
It was an utterly inaccurate description of Hageman, who was adamant that her campaign focused on problems important to people in Wyoming while Cheney was posing for cameras in Washington. Hayes did not care about that situation, however, and just wanted to portray her as someone who only cared to mindlessly follow Trump.
When first reading about the accusations against Hageman, one might wonder if this could be an issue with the voicemail getting disconnected, which meant there was no reason to call her a liar. Surely there was a perfectly rational explanation and Politico could have looked further into the story to know the truth. Furthermore, why would someone lie about something such as this? If she were to say that she was accusing Cheney of having not called to admit defeat, wouldn't it make sense to say that she never got a call? That would have been less obvious.
Hageman kept the voicemail and it was exactly as she stated it was. Cheney called and said, “Howdy, Harriet” with only background chatter following it. So, either Cheney set it up and provided Politico with a fake recording or there was a glitch. Whatever the case, Hageman wasn't lying.
The pro-Cheney group in the GOP, or the remnants of it, is exhausting to keep track of. They won't accept that their leader is a hack who'd rather aid Democrats than her constituents. Hayes and others like him always look to blame others, which is just plain pathetic. Hageman is a typical Republican candidate. There's nothing wrong with her. However, she's not acceptable, since this isn't an issue of merely being a Republican. It’s about the end of the neoconservative movement.
