(USA Features) House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy suggested Thursday that Rep. Liz Cheney could lose her committee assignments after the Wyoming Republican accepted an invite from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to join a panel that will examine the Jan. 6 protest at the U.S. Capitol Building.
In a press conference, McCarthy, a California Republican, said news that Cheney, who was recently removed as House Republican Conference leader, became the only Republican to join the committee took him by surprise.
GOP members voted to replace Cheney with Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York weeks ago because Cheney was one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump.
Now, McCarthy hinted that Cheney could face additional backlash from her fellow Republican lawmakers.
“I’m not threatening anybody with committee assignments,” McCarthy said during the conference.
Still, he said, “It was shocking to me that if a person is Republican, they get their committee assignments from the Republican conference. For somebody to accept committee assignments from Speaker Pelosi—that’s unprecedented.”
Cheney was one of two Republicans who voted in favor of forming the 1/6 Committee; the other was frequent Trump critic Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), who has also railed against GOP leadership.
After Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J., switched from Democrat to Republican, he lost all of his Pelosi-selected committee assignments, The Epoch Times noted.
“I don’t know in history where someone would go get their committee assignments from the speaker and expect them to have them from the conference as well,” McCarthy said regarding the possibility Cheney could lose her assignments too.
“It would seem to me, since I didn’t hear from her, maybe she’s closer to [Pelosi] than us,” he added in what seemed like a jab. “I don’t know.”
Following her assignment, Cheney released a saying she is “honored to have been named to serve,” adding that she believes it serves lawmakers’ “oath to the Constitution, our commitment to the rule of law, and the preservation of the peaceful transfer of power must always be above partisan politics.”