'It's hard to overstate the cynicism' of Adam Schiff's fundraising email following Liz Cheney's primary defeat

Earlier this month, Michigan GOP Congressman Peter Meijer — who backed impeaching Donald Trump but nonetheless has remained critical of Democrats — was defeated in his primary race by John Gibbs. And that was due at least in part to the efforts of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which ran ads that were ostensibly anti-Gibbs but highlighted Gibbs’ support for Trump and belief in things like the conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was stolen.

The DCCC knew exactly what they were doing. And they were proud of themselves for doing it.

And that’s why this fundraising email from Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff especially sticks in my craw. It’ll stick in yours, too. We’re quite accustomed to Schiff being shifty, but this is pretty shifty even for him:

It's hard to overstate the cynicism.

First, @dccc funds a Trump puppet in Michigan to beat one of the few Republicans who stood up to Trump.

Then, @AdamSchiff says Democrats needs your money, because one of the only Republicans "who dared to stand up to" Trump has lost. pic.twitter.com/D6VuxDI9cc

— Peter Savodnik (@petersavodnik) August 18, 2022

The DCCC used donors’ money to help John Gibbs defeat Peter Meijer in the primary race, and now Schiff is using Meijer’s defeat to try to get more money from donors (via ActBlue). It’s almost impressive, in a demented way. Just utterly shameless.

Oh, yes. There’s that, too. We all know that had Liz Cheney won her primary, the Democrats who’ve been using her for their own political gain would drop her like a hot potato. As a Republican politicians with a pretty conservative voting record, she’d be of no use to them any longer. Hell, they’d probably be fundraising off of her win, framing it as a grave threat to the future of this country.

I have seen more than circumstantial evidence that Adam Schiff is a con artist. https://t.co/FxK0rd1wkI

— Eli Lake (@EliLake) August 18, 2022

So have I. So have all of us. And we’ll no doubt see a lot more before Adam Schiff is finished.

cute game. https://t.co/uFIFMbo02W

— T. Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) August 18, 2022

Democratic voters should actually be pretty fed up with this sort of stuff. It makes their party look like a party full of hypocritical opportunists (which, to be fair, is what their party is full of).

In the DC Bubble, Democratic strategists often lose touch with what it’s like to be an organizer on the ground.

It does not help us win over voters when we are forced to be hypocrites. https://t.co/GxmqAzT4eG

— March to the Blue PAC (@MarchToTheBlue) August 18, 2022

The way Democrats cynically talk about Trump being a unique threat to America in order to win elections is infuriating for those of us who think Trump really is a unique threat to America, part 374: https://t.co/6IzFk1rpmI

— Paul Crowley (@ciphergoth) August 18, 2022

Reminder: Very few Democratic politicians are willing to put their money where their mouths are when it comes to Donald Trump being a threat to America or dangerous for democracy. That’s been evident for a long time, but especially in midterm primary races where they’ve actively made pushes for Trump-backed candidates to get the nominations over more mainstream conservative candidates.