Liz Cheney on Trump, Refusing to Back Down Despite ‘Threat of Violence’ and Her Heartbreak over the GOP (Exclusive)

The former congresswoman tells PEOPLE that her father, Dick Cheney, feared for her safety during the Jan. 6 Capitol riot after she spoke out against Donald Trump for denying the 2020 election results

Liz Cheney was elected to Congress in 2016, the same year Donald Trump won the presidency.

In the years that followed, the lifelong Republican — whose father is former Vice President Dick Cheney, 82 — voted with Trump more than 90% of the time. But in 2020, Cheney, 57, broke from her party to urge Trump to respect the electoral process before leading the House investigation into the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. As a result, the mother of five lost her seat in Congress but found an urgent new mission: fighting for her kids’ future.

In writing her new memoir Oath and Honor, “I felt it was really important for people to know what had happened inside the halls of Congress,” Cheney tells PEOPLE. “It’s a cautionary tale.”

All members of Congress pledge an oath to the Constitution when they are sworn in. What did that mean to you?

When it came to the vote to impeach Donald Trump [after the Jan. 6 riot], there were people who said to me, “How can you impeach a president of your own party? How can you vote to impeach a president when 70% of the people of the state that I represented, Wyoming, voted for him in the election?” And it was so clear to me that your oath and your duty to the Constitution has to come before any partisan politics, but it turned out that not that many people felt that way.

Related: Wyoming GOP Votes to No Longer Recognize Liz Cheney as a Republican in Move Her Rep Calls 'Laughable'

How did it feel to realize that most colleagues within your own party did not share your view? 

It was both heartbreaking and also terrifying. Heartbreaking because so many of the people that I had served with, I had so badly misjudged. And it was terrifying that it happened so quickly that people would fall in line [behind Trump’s election denial].

If you look at the days just after Jan. 6, there was agreement among Republicans that Donald Trump was responsible, that he had to be held accountable. And then you look at how quickly that sort of dissolved. That was the terrifying part of it. And because I worked in Eastern Europe just after the [Berlin] wall came down and I worked in Russia and Ukraine just after the Soviet Union collapsed, I knew the history of what happens in tyrannies. And so it was very unsettling to see how quickly that could potentially happen here.

Related: Conservative Rep. Liz Cheney Wants Trump Prosecuted for Role in Jan. 6 Attack: 'Are We a Nation of Laws?'

What advice did your father give you? 

He’s just been absolutely steadfast. And I think that has also given me a lot of strength. Obviously, I have been a member of the Republican Party for decades, he has been for even longer. His advice, his thoughts, his views about what’s required at this moment have certainly given me strength and been a real example for me.

Related: Liz Cheney Says Her Work on Jan. 6 Committee May Be the 'Most Important Thing I Ever Do'

Does he worry about you? 

Certainly he worries about security. And on Jan. 6, he was the one who called to tell me that Trump had said, “We have to get rid of the Liz Cheneys of the world.” And I was getting ready to go give a speech on the floor of the House explaining why we couldn’t object to the electoral votes. And my dad called me to say, “Look, this has put you in danger.” And we had a discussion about whether I should give my speech, and decided I had to. There was no way I could not go forward because of a threat of violence.

You lost your seat in Congress as a result of speaking out. Do you have any regrets?

No. For me, there’s no House seat that is worth violating your oath to the Constitution, or accepting the kinds of behavior that we saw from Donald Trump leading up to and on the 6th. And so it never really seemed to me like there was a choice, because it was so clear what was required.

Related: Liz and Dick Cheney Were the Only Republicans to Attend the House's Anniversary Observance of Jan. 6 Riots

As we head into the 2024 election cycle, what is your hope for your children’s future? 

To me, the most fundamental thing is ensuring that our kids can grow up in a country that’s characterized by the peaceful transfer of power. And we take that for granted. I think people who are my age, people who have kids and grandkids now ... you never had to worry about whether or not the U.S. was going to go through a violent attempt by a president to seize power. But what we saw was how easily that could happen.

I dedicated the book in part to [my kids] with the hope that they always will live in freedom. And it’s a sad thing that we’re at a moment where you even have to question that possibility. But as a mom, that really does drive me in terms of doing everything I can do to make sure to protect that for them.

What does happiness look like for you in the future? 

For me, happiness will be knowing that we’ve righted the ship of our democracy. This is such an incredible country. And we have had such incredible leaders in the past of both parties, people who’ve understood the goodness of America and who’ve been willing to help all of us try to be better.

We’re always going to have policy disagreements, and we should, but having a leader who is going to do everything possible to protect our country and to sustain us and to call on all of us to do our best and to remember the goodness of America, that, to me, will be real happiness. Plus, I’d like some grandchildren.

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