Topline
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday the Republican National Committee should not have censured Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) for serving on the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, and disputed its characterization of the riot as “legitimate political discourse.”
Key Facts
McConnell said at a press briefing that it is "not the job of the RNC" to single out Republicans who hold views that aren't mainstream in the party.
The vast majority of the 168 RNC members voted to censure Cheney and Kinzinger at the organization’s winter meeting last week in Salt Lake City, after GOP officials dropped an earlier effort to expel them from the House Republican conference.
McConnell also took issue with the RNC’s assertion in its censure resolution that the January 6 attack was "legitimate political discourse," with the senator calling it a “violent insurrection.”
Crucial Quote
"It was a violent insurrection for the purpose of trying to prevent the peaceful transfer of power after a legitimately certified election," McConnell said.
Key Background
Cheney and Kinzinger are the only two Republicans on the committee investigating the January 6 attack, and they have faced immense political blowback for voting to impeach former President Donald Trump and accusing him of fomenting the violence on January 6. Cheney last year was stripped from her role as head of the House Republican Conference, while Kinzinger announced he will not seek reelection, in part because he said lies from top political figures are turning the U.S. into a "poisoned country." McConnell was not among the seven Republicans who voted to find Trump guilty of inciting insurrection in his Senate impeachment trial, but he has broken with Republicans by largely shying away from criticizing the investigation into the January 6 attack and repeatedly saying the 2020 presidential election was legitimate. His stance has brought repeated attacks from Trump, who's taken to calling him "the Old Broken-Down Crow" in statements.
Tangent
Former Vice President Mike Pence said last week he had "no right to overturn" the 2020 presidential election results when the Electoral College votes were counted on January 6, 2021, despite Trump and his supporters repeatedly claiming he did have that power. “Frankly, there is almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president,” Pence said in a speech to the Federalist Society on Friday.
Further Reading
RNC Censures Reps. Liz Cheney And Adam Kinzinger For Serving On Jan. 6 Committee (Forbes)
Anti-Trump Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger Won’t Seek Reelection (Forbes)
Mitch McConnell is suddenly legitimizing the Jan. 6 committee. But why? (Washington Post)
Pence Says He ‘Had No Right To Overturn The Election’—And Trump Is ‘Wrong’ To Claim He Did (Forbes)
