It is no secret that Donald Trump hates former Rep. Liz Cheney (R–Wyo.), a leading critic of the former president who joined nine other Republicans in supporting his second impeachment, served as vice chair of the House select committee that investigated the 2021 Capitol riot, and is now campaigning for Vice President Kamala Harris. But contrary to what you may have heard, Trump did not say Cheney “should be fired upon” (as CNN reported), recommend “executing her” (as CNN anchor Sara Sidner claimed), suggest that she “go before a firing squad” (as The Atlantic‘s David Graham averred), or make “a dark and ominous threat” of “death” against her (as The New Republic‘s Hafiz Rashid asserted).
Here is what Trump actually said about Cheney during an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson at a campaign event in Glendale, Arizona, on Thursday night: “She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK? Let’s see how she feels about it—you know, when the guns are trained on her face.” Referring to politicians who are inclined to favor U.S. military interventions, Trump added: “You know, they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building, saying, ‘Oh, gee, well, let’s send, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy.'”
Trump’s remarks about Cheney reflected a standard complaint about armchair interventionists: that they are insulated from the consequences of the wars they support and do not give adequate consideration to the human costs. Although he may have expressed that point in especially vivid terms, he did not argue that Cheney deserved to be shot or killed.
Cheney nevertheless joined other Trump critics in portraying his comments as a death threat. “This is how dictators destroy free nations,” she wrote on X. “They threaten those who speak against them with death. We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.”
The blatant distortion of Trump’s comments is part of a pattern, and it reflects a broader problem. With four days to go before the presidential election, people who rightly worry about what a second term for Trump could mean might have a chance to persuade on-the-fence voters that his authoritarian instincts, reflected in his frequently expressed desire to punish his political opponents after he regains power, make him unfit for office. But when Trump’s critics try to do that by misrepresenting easily checked facts, they encourage potentially persuadable voters to dismiss the case against him as mendacious fearmongering.
Hellbound and Down 