Donald Trump’s Latest Liz Cheney Remarks Spark Fury from His Former Aides

Donald Trump’s comments about Liz Cheney made during a sit-down interview with Tucker Carlson on Thursday in Arizona sparked backlash from some of his former administration aides who found the rhetoric “dangerous and escalatory.”
Trump sat with Carlson in Glendale, Arizona as the former president looked to shore up support in one of the seven swing states that could decide the election. Trump also held a rally, but it was his comments during his sit-down with Carlson that caused a stir.
Cheney continues to be one of the most vocal anti-Trump Republicans, which has caused no shortage of aggravation for the former president. He took aim at her during his interview, calling her “a radical war hawk.”
“Let’s put her with the rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her,” Trump said. “OK, let’s see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face.”
Trump tried to frame his discussion as a critique of politicians in Washington, D.C., who advocate for military intervention, adding: “You know they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building saying, oh gee, well, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy.”
However, his Cheney comments caught the ear of former allies and advisers who have spared no time in condemning the comments and urging others to do the same.
“It’s unconscionable,” former Trump White House director of strategic communication Alyssa Farah Griffin said, during an appearance on CNN’s News Central on Friday morning. “I don’t know how Republican leaders, many of whom served with Liz Cheney and at one point considered her a colleague and a friend, cannot denounce this.”
“It’s dangerous and escalatory,” Griffin said, noting that Trump has already spoken about forming “tribunals against her” should he regain the presidency.
“It is so unpresidential, reckless and dangerous, and needs to be universally condemned,” Griffin added. She later posted on social media platform X that she was “not holding my breath for Mike Johnson or Elise Stefanik to state the obvious that this is unacceptable, dangerous & shameful.”
Johnson is the Republican Speaker of the House. Stefanik succeeded Cheney as House Republican Conference chair after Wyoming voters ousted Cheney following her condemnation of Trump and participation in the House January 6 Committee. Cheney also voted to impeach Trump over the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Trump took to Truth Social on Friday afternoon in an effort to clarify and reframe the comments, writing, “All I’m saying about Liz Cheney is that she is a War Hawk, and a dumb one at that, but she wouldn’t have ‘the guts’ to fight herself.”
Trump continued: “It’s easy for her to talk, sitting far from where the death scenes take place, but put a gun in her hand, and let her go fight, and she’ll say, ‘No thanks!’ Her father decimated the Middle East, and other places, and got rich by doing so. He’s caused plenty of DEATH, and probably never even gave it a thought. That’s not what we want running our Country!”
Trump Campaign National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told Newsweek in an email statement: “President Trump is 100 percent correct that warmongers like Liz Cheney are very quick to start wars and send other Americans to fight them, rather than go into combat themselves.”
“This is the continuation of the latest fake media outrage days before the election in a blatant attempt to interfere on behalf of Kamala Harris,” Leavitt’s statement said, but it did not seem that some others shared that opinion.
Miles Taylor, who served at the chief of staff of the Department of Homeland Security during the Trump administration, called the comments “sick” and wrote on X that “any fellow conservative of conscience should condemn this in the strongest terms.”
Stephanie Grisham, one of Trump’s White House press secretaries during his term, asked, “Where is the line drawn?” in response to the comments, writing on X that “every Republican running for office should be asked if this is OK.”
Cheney herself responded to the comments, writing on X that “This is how dictators destroy free nations.”
“They threaten those who speak against them with death,” Cheney wrote. “We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.”
Cheney and her father have endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president, saying in a joint statement released in September, “In our nation’s 248-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump.”
“He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him. He can never be trusted with power again,” the statement said.
Harris addressed the comments on Friday during a press gaggle between visits to battleground states during her final blitz in the days ahead of the election. She revealed that she had not yet spoken with Cheney, but went on to say that “this must be disqualifying. Anyone who wants to be president of the United States, who uses that kind of rhetoric, is clearly disqualified and unqualified to be president.”
“We see this rhetoric that is violent in nature, where we see this kind of spirit coming from Donald Trump that is so laden with the desire for revenge and retribution, and Liz Cheney is a tough person, she is an incredible American, and I have an incredible amount of respect for her.”
Trump also took a shot at Liz Cheney by addressing her father Dick Cheney’s endorsement, saying during Thursday’s sit-down, “I don’t blame him for sticking with his daughter, but his daughter’s a very dumb individual.”
The former president earlier this year platformed a controversial Truth Social post that appeared to threaten Liz Cheney, saying, “Elizabeth Lynne Cheney is guilty of treason. Retruth if you want televised military tribunals.”
The post started from a meme account on the platform but gained widespread attention after Trump “retruthed” it on his account.
Update, 11/1/24 at 3 p.m. ET: Added fresh comment from Donald Trump and Kamala Harris in response to the backlash.