Top GOP Senator: Not Enough Democrats’ Can Help Liz Cheney Win Primary

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) in Washington on June 23, 2022. Win McNamee/Getty Images

A top Republican senator has proclaimed there are “not enough Democrats” to help Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) win the GOP primary in August.

Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), a member of the GOP leadership in the Senate, told Fox News on Sunday that Cheney’s attacks against former President Donald Trump and her decision to serve as vice-chair on the Democrat-controlled House subcommittee probing the Jan. 6 Capitol incident will cause her significant trouble in her home state. She also voted to impeach Trump in his second trial, which prompted the Wyoming Republican Party to censure her before voting to stop recognizing her as a member.

“Wyoming politics is very personal, it’s face-to-face, it’s town-to-town,” Barrasso told the channel on Sunday. “The travel that I have done around the state, I think she has a lot of work to do if she hopes to win the primary.”

The congresswoman’s chief rival appears to be Trump-backed Harriet Hageman, although she is fending off a number of Republican challengers in Wyoming, which overwhelmingly voted in favor of the former president in the 2020 election.

Barrasso’s comments were a reference to Cheney urging Wyoming Democrats to switch their party affiliation to Republican to vote for her, noting that “this wouldn’t be the first time” Democrats switched to vote in a Republican primary.

But, according to the senator, there are “really not that many Democrats out there” in Wyoming. “Even the chairman of the Democratic Party said there are not enough Democrats to do that,” he said.

Democrat Voters

A website for Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, added a section that asks and answers questions about voting. The site also includes a section on how to switch to Republican to vote for her.

Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) speaks during a Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on Jan. 11, 2022. Reuters/Sarah Silbiger/File Photo

“How do I change my party affiliation to register as a Republican so I can vote for Liz?” the website says.

Several months ago, Cheney claimed that she wouldn’t ask Democrats to vote for her in the primary, saying that it “is not something that I have contemplated, that I have organized or that I will organize.”

In recent public statements, Trump has often said he believes Cheney will lose her reelection bid, noting that another Republican who voted to impeach him, Rep. Tom Rice (R-S.C.), lost by 28 percentage points in the GOP primary several weeks ago.

“Same thing’s going to happen in Wyoming to Virginia ’resident‘ Liz Cheney, that happened in South Carolina to Congressman ’Impeach Master' Tom Rice, who lost as an incumbent by 28 points!” he wrote on social media.

The Epoch Times has contacted Cheney’s office for comment.