The Cheney effect: Liz's loss leads to chilling silence from Kemp

[Nevilledog]

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Amanda Marcotte
@AmandaMarcotte
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The day after Liz Cheney took a 37 point loss in the GOP primary, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp refused to testify against Trump, something he had previously agreed to do.

The timing is not coincidental. An analysis as to why — using Kemp's own legal filing.

salon.com
The Cheney effect: Liz's loss leads to chilling silence from Kemp
Georgia's governor stood up to Trump during the 2020 coup, but now resists turning over evidence to the Fulton D.A.
11:14 AM · Aug 18, 2022

https://www.salon.com/2022/08/18/the-liz-cheney-effect-brian-kemp-gets-cold-feet-over-testifying-against/

Tuesday night, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming lost the Republican primary by 37 points to Harriet Hageman. Cheney has drawn relentless fire from Donald Trump for being one of two Republicans on the House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection. Hageman, on the other hand, ran on a platform of advocating Donald Trump's lies about the 2020 election and denouncing efforts to investigate the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol. Late Tuesday, Trump gloated about Cheney's loss, posting that "Cheney should be ashamed of herself" for standing up against Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election. The very next day, Georgia's Republican governor, Brian Kemp, filed a 121-page motion asking a judge to reject a subpoena to testify in a case investigating Trump's efforts to steal the state's electoral votes from President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

On the surface, these two events may seem unrelated. The timing, however, is likely not a coincidence.

Kemp has gained an undeserved reputation as a "moderate" since Trump's failed coup efforts in 2020, largely because he refused to void out Biden's win in Georgia in 2020 and declare Trump the winner instead. But Kemp's resistance to Trump's anti-democracy efforts has been reluctant, at best. Cheney's primary defeat was expected, but there can be no doubt that the size of it sent a chilling message to the rest of the party: Stand by Trump or else. With his refusal to testify against Trump, it seems Kemp got the message loud and clear.

The Georgia case is being conducted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, who is looking into Trump's extensive efforts to steal the election in Georgia. Kemp was subjected to quite a bit of pressure from Trump during this time. In early December 2020, the Washington Post reported that Trump personally called Kemp to demand that the governor "call a special session of the state legislature for lawmakers to override the results and appoint electors who would back the president at the electoral college." Kemp refused.

In the months since, Kemp has been subjected to a lot of hagiography in the political press over this, casting him as a staunch defender of democracy. The likelier story, however, is that Kemp simply didn't think he had the power to do Trump's bidding. His concerns about the legal consequences have been subsequently validated by the existence of Willis' grand jury investigation. Throughout the entire attempted coup, Kemp's communications strategy was to portray himself as reluctant and hamstrung, not actually resistant to Trump.

*snip*

[The Roux Comes First]

1. We Know What to Do Here, Don't We!!

Like the nose on your face. Donate to and provide all the support we can to Stacey Abrams!

[Lovie777]

4. GQP mob ....

and those docs.

[FBaggins]

2. The timing isn't coincidental?

Someone wrote a 121 page filing in a few hours?

[brooklynite]

3. Doesn't make sense...

Kemp already won his Primary, against precisely the same kind of crackpot that beat Cheney.

[MontanaFarmer]

5. Precisely. Timing is incidental.

Kemp is a worm and would like it both ways, much like the rest of the GOP re: trump but this is not tied to Cheney losing. That outcome has been known for months.