Former Vice President and influential Republican Dick Cheney released a statement announcing his endorsement of Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris for President. Speaking out against the Republican nominee, former President Donald Trump, Cheney said that he can “never be trusted with power again.”
“In our nation’s 248 year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump,” Cheney, 83, said in the statement shared on Sept. 6. “He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him,” he continued, referencing the events of Jan. 6, 2021.
Cheney, who served as Vice President under President George W. Bush between 2001 and 2009 went on to say that American citizens have a “duty” to prioritize the nation over partisan politics.
The statement came Friday, hours after one of Cheney’s daughters, former Wyoming Republican Representative Liz Cheney revealed on a panel at the Texas Tribune’s annual festival that her father will be voting for Harris.
“If you think about the moment we’re in, and you think about how serious this moment is, my dad believes—and he said publicly—there has never been an individual in our country who is as grave a threat to our democracy as Donald Trump is,” she had said on the panel moderated by journalist Mark Leibovich.
Cheney’s endorsement marks the most high profile Republican politician to announce that they will vote for Harris over Republican nominee Trump, further spotlighting other former establishment Republicans who have yet to come out to endorse Trump during this run for the presidency—many of whom have been critical of Trump in the past—including his own former Vice President Mike Pence, former President George W. Bush, and former Republican nominee for President Mitt Romney.
The Harris campaign responded in a statement on Friday, supporting the endorsement.
“The Vice President is proud to have the support of Vice-President Cheney, and deeply respects his courage to put country over party,” said campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon, per the Washington Post.
Trump reacted to Cheney’s statement via a post shared on his own social media platform, Truth Social. He called the former Vice President an “irrelevant RINO”— which stands for Republican in Name Only and is a term used by some to describe Republicans who are viewed as being disloyal to the party.
“He’s the King of Endless, Nonsensical Wars, wasting Lives and Trillions of Dollars, just like Comrade Kamala Harris. I am the Peace President, and only I will stop World War III!,” Trump wrote.
Earlier in the week, Liz Cheney herself publicly supported Harris, announcing her endorsement for the Democratic nominee. “As a conservative and someone who believes in and cares deeply about the Constitution, I have thought deeply about this. And because of the danger that Donald Trump poses—not only am I not voting for Donald Trump, but I will be voting for Kamala Harris,” she said on Sept. 4 at a Sanford School of Public Policy event at Duke University in North Carolina.
The former Wyoming representative was ostracized by Trump-backed Republicans after she sat as one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump over allegations that he incited the assault on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.