RIPON, Wis. — As she turns up the amount on her efforts to court docket disgruntled Republicans in her battle with former President Trump for the White Home, Vice President 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, riot on the U.S. Capitol, has vowed to do all the things she will be able to to forestall 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 Democrat 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 as a consequence of its position in holding a collection of conferences in 1854 that led to the formation of the Republican Social gathering.
Cheney, the daughter of former Republican Vice President Dick Cheney, as soon as rose throughout 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 January sixth riot 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 School 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 No. 3 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 Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., speaks at a marketing campaign occasion for Democrat presidential nominee Vice President Harris in Ripon, Wis., on Oct. 3, 2024. (AP Photograph/Mark Schiefelbein)
In 2022, she misplaced the GOP congressional main in Wyoming to Harriet Hageman, a candidate backed by Trump.
At a talking occasion in early September at Duke College in swing state North Carolina, Cheney introduced that she would vote for Harris within the presidential election. Cheney’s father 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 never be trusted with power again” and emphasised that “in this election, putting patriotism ahead of partisanship is not an aspiration, it is our duty.”
“What January 6 shows us is there is not an ounce, not an ounce, of compassion in Donald Trump. He is petty. He is vindictive. He is cruel. And Donald Trump is not fit to lead this good and great nation,” Cheney stated.
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Harris, talking after Cheney, highlighted that “anyone who recklessly tramples on our democratic values as Donald Trump has, anyone who has actively and violently obstructed the will of the people and the peaceful transfer of power as Donald Trump has … must never again stand behind the seal of the president of the United States.”
And Harris additionally stated that “I take critically my pledge to be a president for all People.
Democrat presidential nominee Vice President Harris arrives at a marketing campaign occasion with former Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., in Ripon, Wis., on Oct. 3, 2024. (AP Photograph/Mark Schiefelbein)
Cheney was not all the time a fan of Harris.
The Trump marketing campaign on Thursday repeatedly pointed to a social media put up by Cheney in the course of the 2000 election by which she stated, “@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, stated Cheney was “terrible” and “a stupid war hawk. All she wants to do is shoot missiles at people.”
On Cheney’s backing of Harris, Trump stated, “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 outstanding 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. (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 nominees, respectively. She’s additionally supported by greater than 100 Republican former nationwide safety officers and different outstanding Republicans.
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Ripon is just not the one city that claims to be the birthplace of the GOP. Exeter, New Hampshire, additionally has some bragging rites because it was the positioning of conferences in 1853 – a yr forward of the Ripon gatherings – by disenchanted political leaders who mentioned the formation of a brand new celebration of Republicans.
However officers in Ripon stated the group in Exeter by no means really fashioned a political group, or selected officers, as they did in Wisconsin.
Vice President Harris, the Democrat presidential nominee, campaigns with former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney in Ripon, Wis., 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 may make an vital influence in what’s going to probably be a race throughout the margins within the battleground states.
