Liz Cheney on response to House Speaker Johnson, Jan. 6 rioters, and Colorado court case

WASHINGTON, D.C. (CBS, KYMA/KECY) - Liz Cheney spoke with Face the Nation moderator Margaret Brennan on Sunday and said House Speaker Mike Johnson’s claim that she considered signing the amicus brief to challenge the 2020 election while she was in House leadership is "not true."

"That’s tyranny," is how Cheney described the brief and Speaker Johnson’s attempts to "throw out the votes of millions of Americans."

Cheney questioned Republican leadership’s ability to defend the Constitution. She said:

"You’ve had Mike [Johnson] on again claiming he has the right, individually, to decide that he's going throw out millions of votes and ignore the rulings of the courts…You don't have to take my word for the fact that you can't count on these elected Republicans to defend the constitution. Every time they go out and give an interview, they demonstrate it themselves."

January 6th riots, Colorado court case, and Secretary Austin's hospitalization

Cheney called New York Representative Elise Stefanik’s use of the word "hostages" in the January 6th attack "outrageous” and "disgusting." She added, "It’s disgraceful for Donald Trump to be saying what he’s saying, and then for those who are attempting to enable him, or attempting to further their own political careers, to repeat it."

During the interview, Brennan and Cheney discussed the Supreme Court taking up the Colorado case removing former President Trump from the ballot, citing insurrection and the 14th Amendment.

"If you look at the Select Committee's work, we made a criminal referral with respect to the part of the 14th amendment that talks about providing aid and comfort to an insurrection. I certainly believe that Donald Trump's behavior rose to that level, I believe that he ought to be disqualified from holding office in the future. It's working its way through the courts. And in the meantime, and in any case, we have to be prepared to ensure that we can defeat him at the ballot box, which ultimately I believe we'll be able to do."

Liz Cheney, Former United States Representative of Wyoming (R)

When asked about Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s hospitalization and reported delay in the Pentagon’s alert to the White House, Cheney said, "I think they've got serious explaining to do. I think there's a real difference between public transparency and, you know, alerting the Commander in Chief to the fact that the Secretary of Defense is in the hospital…That's not the way the Pentagon ought to be conducting business."