Biden To Honor Liz Cheney Three Weeks Before Trump’s Inauguration

President Joe Biden on Thursday will honor former Republican congresswoman Liz Cheney and others with the Presidential Citizens Medal, the second highest award a president can give to civilians.

The award is supposed to be given to those who “have performed exemplary deeds of service for their country or fellow Americans,” The Washington Post reported. Cheney famously became one of President-elect Donald Trump’s most vocal critics and lost her re-election bid in a landslide.

Cheney served as the vice chair of the House select committee that investigated the January 6, 2020, riot at the U.S. Capitol. During her time on that committee, Cheney communicated with an anti-Trump witness behind her lawyer’s back, The Daily Wire reported, an astounding ethical violation for which Cheney faced no legal consequences. Biden aides have discussed a pre-emptive blanket pardon to protect Cheney from any inquiries or indictments from the incoming Trump administration that stem from her actions working against Trump. Biden aides have also discussed such pardons for Anthony Fauci and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA), who perpetuated the Russia collusion hoax against Trump.

Texts from Cheney show that she communicated with the J6 committee’s “star witness,” former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson. Cheney communicated with Hutchinson without her attorney Stefan Passantino’s knowledge.

“Though she worked behind the scenes to obtain Hutchinson’s juiciest allegations in 2022, some of which were later found to be false, Cheney never mentioned the backchannel talks with Hutchinson or Griffin in her book ‘Oath and Honor’ about the riot,” the New York Post reported in October.

Cheney also campaigned with Vice President Kamala Harris in the closing weeks of her losing campaign. Given Biden’s seeming attempts to undermine Harris’ campaign, rewarding Cheney could be seen as a double win for the outgoing president.

Biden is also bestowing the award on Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-MS), who led the J6 committee with Cheney. In 2005, Thompson, along with 30 other Democrats, protested the certification of Ohio’s election results even though then-Sen. John Kerry had already conceded the election.

Other people set to receive the medal are Mary Bonauto, who argued on behalf of same-sex marriage before the Supreme Court in Obergefell v. Hodges, and Evan Wolfson, an attorney who also argued for the legalization of same-sex marriage.

Numerous other people who have been tied to Biden for decades will also receive medals in a ceremony on Thursday, including former senators Ted Kaufman of Delaware, Bill Bradley of New Jersey, and Chris Dodd of Connecticut. Bradley is also a former New York Knicks player.