A Chilling Call to Morality and Reason. A Steely Liz Cheney, at Harris’s Side, Calls It ‘Our Duty’ to Reject Trump.

Friends:

I would say that we've received a number of chilling calls to morality and reason and why Trump should absolutely not be our next president. Accordingly, I offer here yesterday's speech by Liz Cheney who spoke alongside Kamala Harris. Cheney is stepping up to the plate again to explain why Donald Trump is disqualified from being president and how it's we the people who decide. Without equivocation, she further endorses Kamala Harris for president and urges members of her party to do so, as well. I also offer you a great New York Times piece on this. You can also view the entire live presentation from Wisconsin here.

Together with this call to conscience, I ask you to consider this call to reason as put forward by experts at this National Press Club conference that took place recently on September 30. 

Watch Part 2. titled, "Psychiatrists expose Trump's mental deterioration at major conference."
It's all quite chilling to me both in a good way and a profoundly concerning way. Folks have to be sure to get out and vote so that we are not harmed and the vitality of our democracy is preserved. Just because it's not where we want it to be, doesn't mean that we do not fervently act to defend it. Democracy is always unfinished business. It is the task of every generation to both preserve and improve it.

Vote like your life depends on it because it does.
-Angela Valenzuela

A Steely Liz Cheney, at Harris’s Side, Calls It ‘Our Duty’ to Reject Trump

The former congresswoman and Republican exile stumped for Kamala Harris in Ripon, Wis., the birthplace of the G.O.P., calling on conservatives to shun Donald Trump’s “depraved cruelty.”

The former congresswoman and Republican exile campaigned with the vice president in the battleground state of Wisconsin.CreditCredit...Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times Published Oct. 3, 2024

Updated Oct. 4, 2024, 9:35 a.m. ET

By Erica L. Green and Katie Rogers

Erica L. Green reported from Ripon, Wis., and Katie Rogers from Washington. They are White House reporters covering Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign.

It was an exercise in unsubtle and unlikely campaign optics: a Democratic vice president who is running for the presidency. A Republican former congresswoman who is the daughter of a staunchly conservative vice president. A small city known as the birthplace of the Republican Party in the middle of a battleground state.

On Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris and former Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, the most prominent Republican to endorse her campaign, traveled to Ripon in central Wisconsin where meetings in 1854 helped form the Republican Party. Just a mile away from a one-room schoolhouse where those gatherings were held, the pair tore into former President Donald J. Trump for his role in igniting a riot at the Capitol, and they warned of the threat he poses to democracy should he return to power.

Ms. Cheney said that, in November, putting patriotism ahead of partisanship should not merely be an aspiration — “it is our duty.”

Her remarks, delivered with an air of somber restraint, were as much a public indictment of Mr. Trump as they were an endorsement of Ms. Harris. Calling his candidacy “a threat unlike any we have faced before,” she called on conservatives to join her in an “urgent cause” to elect Ms. Harris and to reject what she called the former president’s “depraved cruelty.”

“I know that she will be a president who will defend the rule of law,” Ms. Cheney said of Ms. Harris, “and I know that she will be a president who can inspire all of our children and, if I might say so, especially our little girls.”

The joint appearance was one of the starkest examples to date of how Ms. Harris has endeavored to pitch herself as a unifying president who values pragmatism over partisanship. Her overarching goal is to win over moderate and independent voters who will be crucial to delivering her a decisive victory.

The event took place at Ripon College, where hundreds of people gathered on a lawn near the campus’s main building, which was adorned with American flags and posters that read: “Country over party.” At several points in the program, the crowd cheered, “Thank you, Liz” and “Ka-ma-la.”

Both women spoke about the significance of the site where the Republican Party’s founding leaders first met, bonding over their opposition to slavery. “Liz Cheney stands in the finest traditions of its leaders,” Ms. Harris said.

The vice president said that Ms. Cheney’s endorsement held “special significance,” and that while the two politicians might not agree on much, they shared a love of country and democratic ideals. Repeating her promise to be a president for all Americans regardless of party, Ms. Harris said she had sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution six times in her career.

“The president of the United States must not look at our country through the narrow lens of ideology or petty partisanship or self-interest,” Ms. Harris said. “The president of the United States must not look at our country as an instrument for their own ambitions. Our nation is not some spoil to be won. The United States of America is the greatest idea humanity ever devised.”

She added, “And so, in the face of those who would endanger our magnificent experiment, people of every party must stand together.”

Ms. Harris’s campaign has used Ms. Cheney’s endorsement, and those of a stream of other Republicans, in assailing Mr. Trump as a threat to the republic, and in blunting accusations by his campaign that the vice president is a “radical liberal.”

Mr. Trump responded in the early hours of Friday, writing on his social media site that Ms. Cheney was a “low IQ War Hawk” and that she and Ms. Harris were “a pathetic couple” who were “suffering gravely from Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, blasted the records of both women afterward. “The both of them are made for each other — proponents of endless wars, killers of Social Security, and enemies of American workers,” he said in a statement.

Ms. Harris’s campaign has sought to recast her political image as a left-leaning Californian by downplaying or abandoning some of the progressive positions she held when she first ran for president in the 2020 race. During this campaign, she has branded herself a “pragmatist” and a “capitalist,” and has spoken more openly about issues that appeal to the conservative base, like gun ownership. She has also suggested that she would appoint a Republican to her cabinet, if elected.

In a presidential race that may be won by razor-thin margins in November, Wisconsin appears to be a near tossup between Ms. Harris and Mr. Trump. President Biden won the state by only 20,600 votes in 2020, and a recent poll by The New York Times and Siena College showed Ms. Harris with 49 percent support among likely voters, versus Mr. Trump at 47 percent.

Ms. Harris’s decision to appear alongside Ms. Cheney, a Wisconsin native, signals that her campaign is hoping to appeal to Republican voters who have been repelled by Mr. Trump’s style of politics. The two women agree on little politically beyond their distaste for Mr. Trump. They had next to no relationship when they overlapped in Congress, though they did speak on the phone about Ms. Cheney’s decision to endorse the vice president.

Ms. Cheney was a onetime critic of Ms. Harris. In an August 2020 interview on Fox News, shortly after Mr. Biden chose her as his running mate, Ms. Cheney called Ms. Harris ’s voting record in the Senate “to the left of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.” She added, “It’s very clear, she is a radical liberal.”

Ms. Cheney’s appearance for Ms. Harris on Thursday was also striking because of the timing: On Wednesday, a 165-page brief from the special counsel, Jack Smith, laid out new evidence of how Mr. Trump tried to remain in power despite losing the 2020 election.

During her speech, Ms. Cheney brought up the fresh details, including Mr. Trump’s apparent nonchalance when he was implored to ensure the safety of his vice president, Mike Pence, whom rioters had threatened to hang on Jan. 6, 2021.

“So what?” the former president said, according to the brief.

Ms. Cheney told the crowd, “We have a responsibility, all of us, to remind people that our institutions don’t defend themselves.” She added, “We the people defend our institutions.”

But after the Capitol attack, Ms. Cheney set partisan labels aside. She became the top Republican on the House committee that investigated Mr. Trump’s role in the riot. Suddenly an outcast in her party, she later lost her seat to a Trump-backed challenger.

Calling Mr. Trump “vindictive,” Ms. Cheney said “any person who would do these things can never be trusted with power.”

Ms. Cheney first said she planned to vote for Ms. Harris at a conference last month in North Carolina. It was a major step in a long turnabout for a staunchly conservative former lawmaker, who is pro-gun, anti-abortion and hawkish on national security issues.

Days later, her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, said that he would also vote for Ms. Harris.

On Thursday, Ms. Cheney made clear that she had not strayed from her traditional, Republican bona fides. Her campaign work started at age 10, she said, when she helped seal envelopes for President Gerald Ford’s re-election campaign. She cast her first vote for a presidential race in 1984, she went on, and referred to herself as a Reagan Republican.

“I was a Republican even before Donald Trump started spray-tanning,” she jabbed.

Mr. Trump, for his part, held a rally on Thursday in Michigan, where Ms. Harris will campaign on Friday. During his speech, he continued to claim that he won the 2020 election.

Nicholas Nehamas and Reid J. Epstein contributed reporting from Washington.


Erica L. Green is a White House correspondent, covering President Biden and his administration. More about Erica L. Green


Katie Rogers is a White House correspondent. For much of the past decade, she has focused on features about the presidency, the first family, and life in Washington, in addition to covering a range of domestic and foreign policy issues. She is the author of a book on first ladies. More about Katie Rogers

Happy Birthday, Jimmy Carter! Our Country's Oldest and Perhaps Our Most Beloved Living Presidents

Wow! Our 39th president of the United States (1977-1981), President Jimmy Carter turns 100 years old! Such an incredible milestone considering that fewer than fewer than one percent of Americans ever make it to 100. Among U.S. Presidents, none have lived as long as him. I always said that his presidency was a stepping stone to world-class humanitarian, diplomat, and advocate for peace and human rights. He also carries the unique distinction of being the world's most famous Sunday school teacher in his small church in Plains, Georgia.

I regret not making it to one of his Sunday school classes. My husband and I seriously considered a special trip to Plains but it never materialized. Fortunately, many of his teachings are available online on Youtube.

As I think of all you and your lovely wife, the late Rosalynn have accomplished, I ponder where not only the U.S. but also the world be without your role in the shaping of modern elections, ending disease, philanthropy, and a so on.

What your story also tells is that being world-class

I loved learning that he is less interested in his birthday than living long enough to vote for Kamala Harris. Happy 100, Jimmy Carter! 

May God grant you your wish. 💖

-Angela Valenzuela


Jimmy Carter turns 100 and his hometown is ringing in the milestone

He is the first American president to reach the century mark. Locals are excited to celebrate the man they know as “Mr. Jimmy.”



A sign celebrating former president Jimmy Carter’s 100th birthday is displayed in a shop 

window Monday in Plains, Ga. (Chandan Khanna/AFP/Getty Images)

PLAINS, Ga. — Signs that read “Happy 100th Birthday Mr. President!” dot lawns. The local general store is stocking up on its famous peanut butter ice cream. And the population of this tiny southwestern Georgia town is expected to double for a day.

Jimmy Carter turns 100 Tuesday, and his hometown is pulling out all the stops to celebrate the milestone — even if the former president himself isn’t expected to be attending.

The birthday bash for the first U.S. president to reach 100 will include a military jet flyover, a naturalization ceremony and a concert. Carter, who is in hospice care, has not attended a major event since his wife’s memorial in November 2023.

Throughout Plains, locals are excited to honor the man they know simply as “Mr. Jimmy.” Many residents here have stories about running into Carter at the pharmacy or the peanut shop that sells the flavor of ice cream he enjoys. And even though Plains leans Republican, some houses with yard signs supporting former president Donald Trump also have signs commemorating Carter.

“Everybody in this town is crazy about him,” said Sonya Fox, who works at a medical clinic that Carter helped to establish in the town. “There wasn’t a doubt in our mind that he would make it.”

Jill Stuckey, the superintendent of the Jimmy Carter National Historical Park here in Plains, visits with Carter almost daily and said the former president is in an upbeat mood but fairly nonchalant about his birthday.

“I ask him how it feels being 100, and I really get no reaction,” said Stuckey, adding that Carter often just shrugs his shoulders. “But what he is really interested in is what we are doing to help people around town, or how some of his friends are.”

Carter has never been one for huge birthday bashes. He spent his 52nd campaigning and his 55th, as president, drinking white wine at a D.C. steakhouse with his wife and a few friends. After he lost reelection at 56, Carter returned to the tiny south Georgia town where he was born in 1924. Friends said he’s mostly opted for low-key celebrations ever since.

Boze Godwin, who served as the town’s mayor for 40 years before retiring in January, threw a few lowcountry-boil birthday parties for Carter, and once, when Carter wanted homemade peach ice cream, Godwin drove four hours each way to Steinhatchee, Fla., to buy a gallon.

The only fancy celebration Godwin remembers Carter ever having was his 75th. He commemorated that one with a gala and a fundraiser to restore the Rylander Theatre in Americus, Ga. Pat Boone and the Indigo Girls performed, and Carter cut his birthday cake with a saber he earned at the Naval Academy.




Statistically, Americans have a less than 1 percent chance of living to 100. When Carter took office, just one president, John Adams, had lived to be 90. Since then, Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush have all reached at least 93, but none has lived as long as Carter.

Carter has faced particularly significant challenges over the past decade. In 2015, he was diagnosed with metastatic melanoma, a usually fatal skin cancer that spread to his liver and brain. He has suffered a number of falls in recent years, and in February 2023, he entered hospice care.

Because his health has been so bad, Plains residents didn’t expect him to show up last October when they celebrated his 99th birthday at the annual peanut festival. Most people were watching the parade when a black Chevy Suburban driven by a Secret Service agent suddenly turned onto Main Street. The crowd gasped and cheered as they realized Carter was in the back seat, wearing an Atlanta Braves ball cap and holding hands with Rosalynn, his wife of 77 years.

Former president Jimmy Carter and former first lady Rosalynn Carter make a rare public appearance at the peanut festival parade in Plains, Ga., on Sept. 23, 2023. (Michael S. Williamson/The Washington Post)

Carter was frail then, and family members have said his health has slipped further since Rosalynn died at 96 last November, a month and a half after their birthday ride. He has now been in hospice for nearly 19 months. He needs a wheelchair to get around, and Carter can no longer read or write, Stuckey said, but still watches television sitcoms and news programs.

Carter did not attend this year’s peanut festival, which was on Saturday. He was last spotted out locally around the Fourth of July, when Stuckey said he went to see a fireworks display in a neighboring community.

Nonetheless, his neighbors in Plains have been planning for his 100th celebration for the past year. The military flyover includes four F-18 Jets, which Carter had authorized to build when he was president. The community concert will include performances by country musician Brent Cobb and pianist David Osbourne, who has been playing before the Carters for three decades.

Tickets to the events sold out within a few days. The building where the festivities will take place holds about 300 people — roughly enough spots for only half the town, Stuckey said, and everyone wanted a chance to mark history.

“There’s never been a president to live to 100,” Stuckey said. “It’s very humbling and a great moment in history that we get to have a front-row seat to.”

Family members have said Carter is more interested in the state of the country than he is his own birthday. James Earl “Chip” Carter III told The Washington Post in early September that his father spent days watching the speeches from the Democratic National Convention.

When Chip Carter told his father that many people believe he is trying to stay alive to reach his birthday, the former president pushed back: “He said he didn’t care about that. It’s just a birthday. He said he cared about voting for Kamala Harris.”

Carter’s state of Georgia is critical to the November election. Joe Biden beat Donald Trump in 2020 by less than 1 percent of the vote in the state, and Carter’s family said he can’t wait to cast his mail-in ballot for Harris, the Democratic nominee.

Few cities in America have had such a close-knit relationship with a president as Carter has had with Plains.

In his memoir, “An Hour Before Daylight,” Carter wrote about growing up in a one-story farmhouse on the edge of Plains, just a few generations after the end of slavery, when White and Black Georgians were still figuring out how to live together and rely on one another.

Carter’s family grew peanuts and cotton and struggled, with the help of Black farm hands and neighbors, to make it through the Great Depression. His childhood on the farm left an indelible mark.

“My most persistent impression as a farm boy was of the earth,” Carter wrote. “There was a closeness, almost an immersion, in the sand, loam and red clay that seemed natural and constant.”

After Carter married Rosalynn, the couple built a house in Plains in 1961. They have lived there ever since, except for Carter’s stints in the governor’s mansion in Atlanta and his time in the White House. The home is also from where they launched much of their humanitarian work.


A photo honoring former first lady Rosalynn Carter at the Jimmy Carter National Historical Park on Nov. 27, 2023 in Plains, Ga. (Matt McClain/The Washington Post)

Today, Plains has a population of just 720 residents. Most of the town’s main attractions involve the Carters. The city has commemorated both Jimmy and Rosalynn’s childhood homes. The old train depot where he headquartered his presidential campaign is now a museum. Sixty-five thousand tourists visit the Jimmy Carter National Historical Park each year.

The town’s main drag is home to Bobby Salter’s Plain Peanuts and General Store, which is located in a warehouse once owned by Carter’s family. It sells one of Carter’s favorite treats — peanut butter ice cream.

Most of the shop owners in Plains know the former president personally.

“No one thought we would actually reach this point, but now that we have reached this point, it’s pretty exciting,” said Philip Kurland, owner of the political memorabilia shop Plains Trading Post. “It’s exciting, but it’s sad. The sad part is they don’t come into the stores anymore and they are not as involved.”

Many here aren’t surprised that Carter made it to 100. And they note his longevity isn’t by accident. Even from a young age, Carter’s mother, Lillian, who was a nurse, instilled in him the value of good nutrition. Throughout much of his life, Carter was also an avid runner. In his later years, he had a swimming pool installed at his house so he could keep exercising.

“But both he and Rosalynn ate right, every single meal. They exercised every single day and made it a priority,” Stuckey said. “They were just regimented in their health ethic because they wanted to live as long as they possibly could to help as many people as they possibly could.”

In the lead-up to Tuesday’s celebrations, many from near and far were reflecting on Carter’s legacy. Many Black residents recalled how Carter helped rebuild what they refer to as “the projects,” where many low-income Plains residents reside.

Stanley Lockhart, who is Black and became paralyzed after a swimming accident 15 years ago, said he has so much admiration for Carter that he would always try to say hello to him. Lockhart would lift his elbow just high enough to signal a wave.

“If I see him, I wave to him and he would wave back,” said Lockhart, 52. “He did a lot of good stuff for us and he was a good man.”

Others were reflecting on how his life and career crossed political lines that now feel etched in stone.

“He brought people together instead of dividing them, unlike some people we know,” said Paula Riley, 64, who lives in Randolph County, Ga., and took her family on a tour of Carter’s boyhood home on Monday.

April Kirkman, 67, traveled to Plains from California with her guitar and a song she wrote for the former president. The song is titled, “I Wanna Be a Jimmy Carter Kinda Christian.” She said it is meant to praise a past era when politics and religion were less divisive.

“Faith, hope, love are what I choose,” the lyrics read. “Yea, yea, a Jimmy Carter kinda Christian. No, no, I ain’t talking ’bout religion. Just wanna walk a mile in those size 11 shoes.”

By Tim Craig Tim Craig is a national reporter on the America desk. He previously served as head of The Washington Post’s Afghanistan-Pakistan bureau, based in Islamabad and Kabul. He has also reported from Iraq, the District and Baltimore.follow on X @timcraigpost

By Casey Parks Casey Parks is a reporter on The Washington Post's America team.