July 01, 2021 09:22 AM UTC

Cheney, Pelosi Call McCarthy’s Bluff on Jan. 6 Committee

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• by: Colorado Pols

Weeks after Republicans in both the House and Senate killed efforts to create a bipartisan committee to investigate the January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pressed ahead with forming an investigative committee anyway.

As The Washington Post reports:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) announced Thursday that Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) will chair the select committee that will probe the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob, and Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) will serve as a member.

Cheney has been outspoken in her criticism of former president Donald Trump and was one of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach him for “incitement of insurrection.

The House on Wednesday approved legislation establishing the 13-member committee, with all but two Republicans — Cheney and Rep. Adam Kinzinger (Ill.) — opposing the measure.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy this week warned Republicans not to accept a position on Pelosi’s Jan. 6 committee, threatening to strip Members of all current committee assignments if they accepted an invitation. Illinois Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger, for one, was not impressed with McCarthy’s threats:

Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney was equally unimpressed and has accepted Pelosi’s invitation to join the investigating committee. Cheney issued this statement, as reported by POLITICO:

“What happened on January 6th can never happen again. Those who are responsible for the attack need to be held accountable and this select committee will fulfill that responsibility in a professional, expeditious, and non-partisan manner.”

Prior to McCarthy’s warning, Colorado Rep. Lauren “Q*Bert” Boebert (R-ifle) had suggested that she would be interested in serving on the Jan. 6 committee. Pelosi apparently took that idea about as seriously as anything else Boebert says.