By Sarah Motter, WIBW TV
LAWRENCE, Kan. (WIBW) - Liz Cheney is not the first woman to be punished by her political party for scrutinizing the party’s leader.
The University of Kansas says House Republicans voted to oust U.S. Representative Liz Cheney (R-Wy.) on Wednesday as the conference chair. It said the vote was taken as a repercussion of her refusal to back former President Donald Trump’s claims about the 2020 presidential election and for voting to convict in his impeachment. Political expert Teri Finneman said this is not the first time a woman has taken a political stand against her party.
According to Finneman, associate professor of journalism and mass communications, the story is similar to what happened in 1950 with Republican Sen. Margaret Chase Smith.
“This isn’t the first time that a Republican woman has stood up and tried to be the conscience for her party,” said Finneman. “In 1950, Chase Smith also took issue with what she called the ‘selfish political exploitation of fear, bigotry, ignorance and intolerance’ in relationship to Joe McCarthy’s grip on the party.”
Finneman said Chase Smith’s Declaration of Conscience speech raised her profile enough so that she was considered a possible candidate for the Republican vice-presidential nomination two years later. She said press coverage in 1952 called Chase Smith “perhaps the most successful U.S. woman politician of any year” and she would run for president in 1964.
Additionally, Fineman has written at length regarding press coverage of first ladies, the Women’s Suffrage Movement and the history of journalism while hosting her podcast, “Journalism History.”
To watch the podcast, click HERE.
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