In a surprise, GOP Rep. Liz Cheney announced Thursday that she would stay in the House rather than seek Wyoming’s open Senate seat. Cheney’s decision means that former Rep. Cynthia Lummis is still the only notable GOP candidate running for the Senate in this very red state, though that may change now that the congresswoman has taken her name out of contention.
Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, had unsuccessfully sought this seat six years ago when she launched a primary bid against Sen. Mike Enzi. Cheney aborted that campaign in early 2014 after a disastrous few months on the campaign trail, but she resurrected her political career in 2016 by winning the race to replace the retiring Lummis as Wyoming’s only House member.
Cheney was immediately mentioned as a potential candidate in May when Enzi announced that he would not seek another term, and the Washington Examiner soon reported that her House colleagues expected her to seek a promotion. Cheney herself increased her fundraising over the next several months, which was another indication that she was getting ready to run to succeed Enzi.
However, a Senate bid would still have been risky for Cheney. Lummis, her predecessor in the House, announced her own bid to succeed Enzi last summer, so Cheney would not have been assured victory in the August GOP primary. And even if Cheney had won, she could have lost influence in the capitol. Cheney is the third-ranking Republican in the House after just two terms so she has a good chance to rise to the top of the party’s leadership before too long, but she would be starting from the bottom all over again if she’d gone to the Senate.
Cheney’s decision not to run for the Senate is very good news for Lummis, who as the only credible GOP candidate is now the frontrunner by default. (The two sweetest words in the English language.) However, Lummis could still face opposition in August from conservative mega donor Foster Friess, who took second place in the 2018 gubernatorial primary. Friess said late last year that he was still considering a Senate bid and hinted he'd take his time deciding. The filing deadline isn’t until the end of May, so there’s time for other Republicans to enter the race.
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