Trump calls for Liz Cheney to be jailed for investigating him over Capitol attack

Donald Trump has renewed calls for Liz Cheney – his most prominent Republican critic – to be jailed for her role in investigating his actions during the January 6 Capitol attack launched by his supporters in 2021, a move that is bound to raise further fears that the former president could persecute his political opponents if given another White House term.

In posts on Sunday on his Truth Social platform, Trump said other members of the congressional committee that investigated the Capitol attack – and concluded he had plotted to overturn his 2020 electoral defeat to Joe Biden – should be imprisoned.

Those statements followed Trump’s previous comments that he would act like a “dictator” on the first day of a second presidency if given one by voters.

Cheney, who served as vice-chair of the January 6 committee and was one of two Republicans on the panel, lost her seat in the House of Representatives to a Trump-backed challenger, Harriet Hageman, in 2022. She responded later on Sunday, saying her fellow Republican Trump is “afraid of the truth”.

Trump has been charged with four felonies in relation to his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, including conspiracy to defraud the United States. The US supreme court is considering Trump’s claim that he has absolute immunity from prosecution in the case because he served as president from 2017 to 2021.

Trump is also facing charges of 2020 election interference in Georgia, retention of government secrets after he left the Oval Office and hush-money payments that were illicitly covered up.

On Sunday, Trump wrote that Cheney should “go to jail along with the rest” of the select January 6 House committee, which he sought to insult in his post on Truth Social by calling it