Liz Cheney, the former Republican Wyoming congresswoman and vocal critic of Donald Trump, has launched a new political action committee (PAC) which aims to stop the former president re-entering the White House.
Cheney, one of two Republicans who were part of the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 attack, announced The Great Task PAC on Wednesday while urging others to "join me in the fight for our nation's freedom."
The PAC, named after a quote from Abraham Lincoln, was announced the same day that Nikki Haley dropped out of the GOP presidential primary. The move paved the way for Trump to be confirmed as the party's 2024 nominee, setting up a rematch against President Joe Biden in November.
In a post on X, formerly Twitter, while promoting the group she is sponsoring, Cheney wrote: "The GOP has chosen. They will nominate a man who attempted to overturn an election and seize power. We have eight months to save our republic & ensure Donald Trump is never anywhere near the Oval Office again."
On its website, The Great Task describes itself as a multi-candidate PAC which focuses on "reverence for the rule of law, respect for our Constitution, and a recognition that all citizens have a responsibility to put their duty to the country above partisanship."
"The Great Task is designed to educate and mobilize Americans in a unified effort to ensure that our Republic endures," it adds.
Trump's office has been contacted for comment via email.
Cheney previously suggested that she could launch a third-party presidential bid to challenge Trump.
"I think that the situation that we're in is so grave, and the politics of the moment require independents and Republicans and Democrats coming together in a way that can help form a new coalition, so that may well be a third-party option," Cheney told USA TODAY in December 2023.
Cheney has long faced the scorn of Trump and other MAGA Republicans for her criticism of the former president, including being one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump over the January 2021 attack on the Capitol.
The Wyoming Republican Party also voted to censure Cheney and no longer considered her as a member of the GOP because of her opposition to the former president.
She left office in January 2023 after losing her GOP primary to the Trump-endorsed candidate Harriet Hageman in August 2022.
The PAC's name refers to the "great task" that Lincoln suggested the country must endure at his 1863 Gettysburg Address during the Civil War.
During the speech, Lincoln urged that "we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain. That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from this earth."
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Ewan Palmer is a Newsweek News Reporter based in London, U.K. His focus is reporting on US politics, domestic policy ... Read more
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