CASPER, Wyo.—Wyoming’s Big Sky deserts, high plains, and glacier-gilded peaks are the backdrop for a mid-August showdown in a summer of discontent within the Republican Party.
Former President Donald Trump and his claims of a stolen election are not on trial in crimson red Wyoming, where he won 69.9 percent of the vote in 2020, more than any other state.
Instead, Wyoming’s only congressional representative, three-term Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), is the one on trial for her vocal criticism of the former president, voting with 10 House fellow Republicans for his impeachment, and serving as co-chair of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol breach.
Trump is backing challenger Harriet Hageman, a Fort Laramie natural resources attorney, in the Aug. 16 Republican congressional district primary and taking an active role in the election, including lobbying Republican Gov. Mark Gordon in March to endorse a bill closing state primaries to “cross-over voting” and staging a May Casper rally for Hageman.
Hageman has ridden that endorsement from Trump to a huge lead in the polls, including a June 15 Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy/Casper Star-Tribune survey that found she is leading Cheney by more than 22 points.
Although Hageman is Trump-endorsed, she has not made his claims of a “stolen election” central to her campaign. She has focused on inflation, the economy, energy policy, and the fact that Cheney is rarely in Wyoming, choosing to probe Trump’s role in Jan. 6 events this summer instead of meeting and greeting constituents she is supposed to be representing.
Liz Cheney has long forgotten she works for Wyoming (or perhaps she never knew), not the Radical Democrats. Wyoming deserves a Congresswoman who will represent us AND our conservative values. It's time to retire elitist Liz Cheney. pic.twitter.com/dj2NLaDCiy
— Harriet Hageman – Text WYOMING to 90103 (@HagemanforWY) August 4, 2022
Hageman in campaign events had not conclusively said the 2020 election was stolen until Aug. 3 when she said that the 2020 election was “rigged” in favor of President Joe Biden.
“Absolutely the election was rigged. It was rigged to make sure that President Trump could not get reelected,” Hageman said at Washington Park, according to the Casper Star-Tribune. “What happened in 2020 is a travesty.”
By John Haughey
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