Florida GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz is taking his public feud with fellow Republican Rep. Liz Cheney on the road – to Wyoming, Cheney’s home state.
Gaetz told Breitbart News on Monday that he wants to visit Wyoming on Thursday to “inspire” voters to oust Cheney, even as Gaetz and other Trump-supporting lawmakers want her fired as the No. 3 Republican in the House.
Cheney has angered scores of House Republicans by faulting former President Donald Trump for the tragic Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol and for voting – along with all Democrats and nine other GOP lawmakers – to impeach Trump.
“In the wake of the Biden presidency, the Republican Party establishment is trying to wrangle the conservative movement back under their control,” said Gaetz.
“They want the GOP to look and sound like Liz Cheney. I have a competing vision for Republicanism and I intend to showcase it by going after the ‘America Last’ politicians in both parties.”
In a tweet, Gaetz noted that he knows “Wyoming can do better.”
In response, Cheney’s spokesperson told the Washington Examiner, “Rep. Gaetz can leave his beauty bag at home. In Wyoming, the men don’t wear make-up.”
Gaetz also told Breitbart that he also resented Cheney for supporting a primary challenger to Rep. Thomas Massie, a staunchly conservative Republican from Kentucky.
“Liz was the first to demonstrate a vindictive style by going after Thomas Massie when he got crossways with the president and looked vulnerable. Thomas, obviously, wasn’t vulnerable; he was very strong and won that primary overwhelmingly, but it showed a lot about how Liz Cheney approaches politics,” said Gaetz.
Gaetz also told Breitbart that he doesn’t dislike Cheney personally, and really doesn’t really know her very well.
“But my disagreements with her are serious,” he added. “And they are about serious policy issues. I would argue that they are some of the most serious when talking about matters of war and peace.”
“And for her to utilize a spokesperson to retort about my looks says more about her approach to politics than it does about me. I know, when I’m offering a critique of a political figure or a worldview, I don’t have to go through a spokesperson. I level my charges directly, and I’m going to Wyoming to do just that.”
In a recent interview with Fox News, Gaetz said Cheney was “spitting into the eyes” of millions of Trump voters by backing Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s push for impeachment.
Gaetz is one of at least 115 U.S. House Republicans who have backed a petition to remove Cheney from her post in Congress.
But while Cheney is catching heat from her colleagues in Washington, the pressure on her is also building back home.
Within recent days, the Wyoming Republican Party issued an open letter to Cheney, saying she was tending to “the interest of the Beltway elites” instead of her constituents, and aiding “leftists and progressives” who “are using (the riot) to smear the entire conservative movement and all Republicans.”
One county-level Republican group in Wyoming voted unanimously to censure Cheney and forwarded its resolution to the statewide party for formal action.
A Change.org petition supporting a recall vote for Cheney has gathered more than 50,000 signatures, more than one-quarter of the total votes she received in last year’s election.
Meanwhile, Republican state Sen. Anthony Bouchard has filed to challenge Cheney in 2022. He said because of her impeachment vote, “Cheney should be run out of town, and back to Virginia for joining the blame game!”