It is possible that no other midterm primary is receiving as much attention as Wyoming Representative Liz Cheney's race, which will take place next week and has the potential to be the most high-profile test yet of voter reaction – or lack thereof – to a Republican serving on the House Jan. 6 committee and whether anti-Trump conservatives have a path forward within their own party.
On Tuesday, voters in the smallest state in the country will cast their ballots and issue their judgement. There is not much of a probability that Cheney will be reelected at this time: According to FiveThirtyEight, her opponent, Wyoming attorney Harriet Hageman, has defeated her in prior head-to-head polling match-ups, helped in part by a blessing from former President Donald Trump. Hageman is running for the seat currently held by Republican Senator Mike Enzi. On Thursday, Cheney disseminated an advertisement that epitomized her concluding point, which was as follows: the "big lie" about the election in 2020 – and Trump's endorsement of it – is killing democracy.
It will become obvious very soon whether or not that argument is able to convince a sufficient number of the core supporters of her party. Recent conversations with a dozen Wyoming voters, on the other hand, suggest that their attention is being diverted to other matters.
ABC News was told by Republicans in the state that Trump won by a margin of 70 points that their relationship with their three-term congresswoman is deteriorating. Residents of Wyoming believe that Cheney does not longer politically represent them, despite the fact that they are dissatisfied with Cheney's prominent position on the Jan. 6 committee, which she co-chairs, and her tough stance against Trump's baseless election attacks. In addition, residents of Wyoming believe that Cheney no longer represents them.
Photos posted on social media by Cheney's team demonstrate that she has been campaigning in Wyoming, despite the fact that, unlike her opponent, she is not organizing large-scale events under big-tent settings. According to Wyoming state Representative and Cheney surrogate Landon Brown, this is because there are fears for her safety as a result of her becoming one of the most prominent anti-Trump Republicans in the country.
Brown, like Cheney, stated that the contest is about the existential choice that the Republican Party must make: whether or not to embrace Trump's never-ending insistence that the previous presidential election was stolen from him, or whether or not to move on.
In an interview with Jonathan Karl from ABC News from the previous month, Cheney stated that bringing attention to Trump's criticisms on elections was more essential than her own candidacy. However, she claimed at the time that she was putting a lot of effort towards winning. An anti-Trump congressman who had sided with Trump more than 90% of the time may be saved by Democrats if they made an unprecedented effort at the last minute to vote against their party's platform in order to spare the lawmaker.
Voters in Wyoming have the ability to switch their party affiliation at any time up until 14 days before the primary election, as well as at voting sites on the day of either the primary or general election. According to the laws of the state, voters also have the ability to switch their party allegiance for any future elections.
As a direct consequence of this, Wyoming Democrats have the potential to vote as Republicans in the primary on Tuesday. However, an analysis conducted by FiveThirtyEight found that it is unlikely for them to make up the deficit with Republicans, given the state's larger conservative population: the Republican Party has 70% of the vote in the state. Despite this, it was found that it is unlikely for them to make up the deficit with Democrats.
In addition, more than eighty percent of primary votes have been cast for Republican candidates in each and every midterm election held over the course of the past decade. This indicates that even individuals who have not stated which party they are affiliated with are likely to vote for the Republican candidate.
According to statements made to ABC News by a number of Wyoming Democrats who have resigned from their own party and temporarily registered as Republicans, the decision to do so was not made lightly.
Despite the fact that the Cheney campaign website leads people who are interested in switching parties to the county clerk's office, the Cheney campaign continues to deny that this occurs.
She stated that she had been bombarded with mailers pushing her to make the change, and she claimed to have received a lot of them. She asserts that the majority of the people living in her area have held their liberal beliefs throughout their lives; nonetheless, there are yard signs for Cheney all over the place.
The Cheney team is adamant that they are not going after Democrats, but they are willing to take any support they can get.
There is a group in Wyoming called Wyomingites Defending Freedom and Democracy that is the driving force behind much of the effort to switch parties. Earlier this week, the group even cut pro-Cheney ads with Democratic Representatives. Both Minnesota's Dean Phillips and New Jersey's Tom Malinowski were nominated.
It appears that their efforts have started to bear fruit: The most recent month's election statistics from the state shows that at least a few thousand Democrats who are registered to vote appear to have changed their registration status.
The preceding is a summary of an article that originally appeared on The Daily Cable.