Liz Cheney

It’s a tough time to be a Republican woman in the age of Donald Trump — unless you’re Rep. Liz Cheney.

The 52-year-old daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney is poised to take on a critical role as the highest-ranking Republican woman in House history.

House Republicans chose the lawmaker from Wyoming, first elected in 2016, to lead their communications strategy as House Republican Conference chair next Congress. That makes Cheney the No. 3 Republican in the chamber behind Reps. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Steve Scalise (R-La.).

Cheney’s ascent comes as female voters around the nation, particularly suburban women, have largely rejected the president and the GOP. Democrats romped to a 40-seat pick-up on Election Day in part because of the GOP’s alienation of women who don’t appreciate Trump’s bombast, aggressive tone and brash style.

And it’s not just female voters. The number of House Republican women is also dwindling by a staggering amount — such that retiring Florida Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen recently joked that female GOP lawmakers like herself were an “endangered species.” House Republicans will have a mere 13 women in their ranks next Congress, down from 23 this year — the lowest number since the early 1990s.

Enter Cheney, a mother of five, who’s seeing her star rise despite the GOP’s problem with women. A former attorney and principal deputy assistant secretary of State for the Middle East, Cheney has quickly gained the respect of her colleagues in her two years on Capitol Hill. And the GOP is looking to Cheney to help rebuild its messaging.

“We need somebody who is articulate and well-respected; she’s both, and she’s a fighter,” said Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.).

A defense hawk like her father, Cheney sits on the House Armed Services Committee, where she has pushed back on her own leadership to fight for more Pentagon spending. She’s not afraid to lock horns with her GOP colleagues and recently worked behind the scenes to oust and seize the leadership post of Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.), the previous conference chair.

Cheney’s sudden challenge for the position, declared around Election Day, caught McMorris Rodgers by surprise. She came out of nowhere, quietly secured the blessing of senior Republicans to challenge one of their own and won despite her relatively junior status. (McMorris Rodgers decided not to run again.)

“Too often we have found ourselves playing catch up without access to useful information, and we have not been on offense,” Cheney wrote in a “Dear Colleague” letter declaring her candidacy. “Constantly playing defense in the battle of communications is a recipe for failure. We need to work as a team to use all our messaging tools to drive our agenda.”

Cheney, who declined to be interviewed, will likely draw on her background as an international policy wonk — and a demi-TV personality — in her new role. In 2012, Cheney joined Fox News as a political commentator, but left when she decided to primary Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.) for re-election in 2014. She quickly withdrew her challenge when it became clear she’d lose but turned her eye on the lower chamber the next cycle, when she raised money quickly and defeated seven other GOP contenders in the 2016 primary. Now, Cheney holds the same seat her father did from 1979 to 1989.

On the issue of women, Cheney doesn’t believe anything needs to change to help her party win back women — at least not policy-wise, she told The Washington Post in a recent interview. So long as Republicans do a better job of marketing and framing their positions as providing security for moms and families, Republicans will be fine, she has said.

Cheney’s approach echoes a marketing strategy she and other Republican women used in 2004 to help re-elect then-President George W. Bush and her father. Cheney helped with the campaign known as “W is for women,” which touted to female voters Bush’s effort to protect the nation after Sept. 11. — Rachael Bade

Photos by Mandel Ngan/Getty Images.