Vice President Kamala Harris and credulous media outlets seized on Donald Trump’s statement Thursday night that GOP ex-Rep. Liz Cheney was “a radical war hawk” to falsely accuse the Republican nominee of calling for the former lawmaker’s “execution” by firing squad, calling it a “disqualifying” message just four days before the election.
“He has increased his violent rhetoric, Donald Trump has, about political opponents and in great detail, in great detail, suggested rifles should be trained on former Rep. Liz Cheney,” Harris, 60, told reporters while campaigning in Wisconsin.
“This must be disqualifying,” she said. “Anyone who wants to be president of the United States who uses that kind of violent rhetoric is clearly disqualified and unqualified to be president. Representative Cheney is a true patriot who has shown extraordinary courage in putting country above party.”
A Harris campaign press release Friday morning had also declared: “Donald Trump sat down with Tucker Carlson in a late-night town hall where he suggested that Republican Liz Cheney should face a firing squad.”
In fact, the 45th president had not said that when he spoke with the former Fox News host at a Thursday event in Arizona, with proceeds going to those impacted by Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
“She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with a rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her, OK?” Trump, 78, said of Cheney, 58, at the event. “Let’s see how she feels about it, you know, when the guns are trained on her face.”
“You know they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building saying, ‘Oh gee, let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy,’” he added.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes shockingly announced Friday afternoon that she was investigating whether the remarks amounted to a death threat against the ex-Wyoming Republican.
“I have already asked my criminal division chief to start looking at that statement, analyzing it for whether it qualifies as a death threat under Arizona’s laws,” Mayes told 12News in Phoenix in a Friday taping for the public affairs show “Sunday Square Off.”
Trump then doubled down on Cheney’s “war hawk” moniker during a stop at a Michigan coffee shop Friday afternoon.
“She’s a war hawk. She kills people,” Trump said at The Great Commoner, an Arab-American-owned business in Dearborn.
“If she had to do it herself, if she had to face the consequences of battle, she wouldn’t be doing it,” Trump told reporters.
“She’s actually a disgrace,” he added. “She’d be the first one to chicken out.”
The vice president also said Friday the so-called “violent rhetoric” by Trump represented the stakes of the 2024 election itself.
“Either you’re going to have Donald Trump there, who will be stewing over his enemies list, or I will be there working hard on your behalf on my to-do list,” she said. “That is the choice, among many, that is at stake in this election and I would be proud to earn the vote of the American people.”
Left-leaning media had also suffered a nervous breakdown over the Thursday night comments.
“TRUMP CALLS FOR CHENEY’S EXECUTION,” the news aggregator Drudge Report’s banner blared, inaccurately.
“WORLD IN SHOCK,” stated subsequent Drudge headlines, which linked to an article that quoted from no world leaders. “EX-PRESIDENT INCREASES VIOLENT THREATS AGAINST OPPONENTS.”
MSNBC host Joe Scarborough loved the Drudge banner so much, he demanded his producers “keep it up” for the duration of an unhinged morning segment on the remarks.
“Guys, if we can screenshot Drudge and put it up, that would be great,” Scarborough said. “People won’t believe it.”
“Put the Drudge Report back up because people won’t believe it,” he demanded later, claiming that the known anti-Trump media mogul was in fact a fan of the former president.
“Here, it’s Trump people,” the “Morning Joe” host said in reference to Drudge.
Harris spokesman Ian Sams was welcomed on during the airing of grievances to denounce “this dangerous, violent rhetoric.”
“I mean, think about the contrast between these two candidates,” Sams said. “You have Donald Trump who is talking about sending a prominent Republican to the firing squad, and you have Vice President Harris talking about sending one to her cabinet. This is the difference in this race.”
Rolling Stone put the Harris campaign’s spin directly into one of its headlines: “Trump Fantasizes About Putting Liz Cheney in Front of a Firing Squad.”
“Trump Fantasizes About Shooting Female Rival in the Face,” an egregiously wrong Daily Beast headline also had it.
“Trump threatens ex-Rep. Liz Cheney with execution by firing squad,” the New York Daily News piled on.
Kasie Hunt also fell in line at the top of the 6 a.m. hour on “CNN This Morning.”
“Four days out from Election Day, and former President Donald Trump is escalating his violent rhetoric, suggesting that one of his most prominent critics, Liz Cheney, should be fired upon,” Hunt said.
“Let’s sit with that for a moment. Of course, violent rhetoric, it’s not new for Trump,” she added. “But this stark moment represents an escalation, at a tense moment when the country is on edge heading into Tuesday.”
“This is how dictators destroy free nations,” tweeted Cheney, who endorsed Harris in September. “They threaten those who speak against them with death. We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant. #Womenwillnotbesilenced #VoteKamala.”
Noted anti-Trumper and former Republican presidential candidate Joe Walsh, however, called out the erroneous media campaign.
“Trump did NOT call for Liz Cheney to be executed,” said Walsh, who is also supporting Harris’ candidacy.
“This is what’s so wrong with our politics today. Look, you know how I feel about Trump, and I’ve been out there every day for 2-3 months campaigning my ass off to help get @KamalaHarris elected, but this short clip is so deceptive,” he went on.
“Trump is NOT calling for Liz Cheney to be executed in front of a firing line. He’s not. Listen to the entirety of what he said.
“In Trump’s typically stupid, ugly fashion, he’s trying to make a point about Cheney’s stance on war. But [X clip aggregator] Aaron [Rupar] (who I like & respect), by posting ONLY this 11 second clip, makes it look like he’s calling for her to be executed,” Walsh added.
“He’s not. He’s an utterly horrible human being who’s utterly unfit for office, but the truth should always matter. And the truth is that Trump is not calling for Liz Cheney to be executed. But … this 11 second clip will have a gazillion views, and the truth will have just a handful of views.”
Vox scribe Zack Beauchamp concurred.
“Folks, Trump didn’t threaten to execute Liz Cheney. He actually was calling her a chickenhawk, something liberals said about her for ages,” Beauchamp posted to rain on the Harris allies’ parade.
“Look at the context — Trump is talking about giving her a weapon. Typically, people put in front of firing squads aren’t armed.”
Dispatch editor-in-chief Jonah Goldberg also took back his “inaccurate” comments on Hunt’s CNN panel Friday morning that Trump wanted to “execute a political opponent.”
“This morning on CNN I referred to Trump’s ‘rifles’ quote as him advocating a ‘firing squad’ for Liz Cheney. I was reacting in haste to what were objectively appalling and irresponsible comments that had been framed in the set-up piece in the context of previous statements Trump made about shooting protestors [sic] and having generals ‘executed,’” Goldberg said on X.
“Still, I was wrong to say he was calling for a firing squad execution,” the right-leaning commentator admitted. “After I said that, my co-panelist, Brad Todd made the case that I was wrong. Brad was right and, again, I was wrong.”
“Trump was making – albeit in his customary fashion – a different argument about Cheney’s alleged foreign policy views and the use of force,” he acknowledged. “I let my disgust at Trump’s comments get the better of me as this was the first time I’d heard them.”
“I regret the initial comment because it was inaccurate and contributed to the kind of overheated environment Trump thrives on,” he added.
As recently as the 2020 presidential campaign cycle, current Harris campaign backers were calling out Cheney over her hawkish stance.
“Taking national security advice from a Cheney has already caused irreparable damage to our country,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) tweeted in August 2019 as he ran for the nation’s highest office. “We don’t need any more, thanks.”
“[My Feeling When] Liz Cheney of all people tries to offer foreign policy takes, as if an entire generation hasn’t lived through the Cheneys sending us into war since we were kids,” groused “Squad” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) the same month, posting a GIF of her giving the camera the stinkeye.
The Democratic socialists have both endorsed Harris for president in 2024.
The Trump campaign issued its own press release on Friday debunking the hoax.
“President Donald Trump explained Thursday night that warmongers like Liz Cheney are very quick to start wars and send other Americans to fight them with no regard for the lives lost,” it read.
“The press has been disgracefully covering these remarks by saying that President Trump suggested that Liz Cheney should be put in front of a ‘firing squad,’” the campaign said.
“Are these reporters malicious or dumb? President Trump was clearly describing a combat zone. Liz Cheney and Kamala Harris, if elected, would continue to plunge the U.S. deeper into war leading to World War 3 and allow innocent men and women to die in that conflict.”
