Liz Cheney defends herself against Trump's violent rhetoric: “This is how dictators destroy free nations”

Former Republican Rep. Liz Cheney is firing back at Donald Trump after the former president darkly suggested putting Cheney in the firing line as he criticized her as a “war hawk.”

“This is how dictators destroy free nations. They threaten death to those who speak out against them,” Cheney posted on

Trump attacked Cheney at an event with Tucker Carlson in battleground Arizona on Thursday night.

“She’s a radical war hawk,” Trump said of the former Wyoming congresswoman as he went after her and her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney.

“Let’s put them there with a nine-barreled gun shooting at them, okay?” Trump said. “Let's see how she feels, you know, with the guns pointed at her face.”

Trump continued: “You know, they're all war hawks when they sit in a nice building in Washington and say, 'Oh, man, well, let's send a – let's send 10,000 troops straight into the jaws of the enemy.' '”

The Harris campaign called Trump's “nine barrels” statement a reference to a traditional nine-gun “firing squad.”

Cheney, a Republican but a vocal critic of Trump over his behavior after the 2020 election and on January 6, 2021, has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 election.

While campaigning alongside Harris, Cheney called Trump a threat to democracy and the Constitution.

“We see it every day, someone who was willing to use violence to try to seize power, to stay in power, someone who I think is, quite frankly, an irredeemable disaster, and we have to do everything we can “To make sure he doesn't get re-elected,” Cheney told ABC News chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl on ABC's “This Week” earlier this fall after publicly endorsing Harris.

Trump's comments against Cheney are the latest in a series of increasingly dark and violent campaign rhetoric.

The former president reiterated his “enemy within” language after previously suggesting that Democrats pose a greater threat to the US in the 2024 election than major foreign adversaries such as China and Russia.

“We have an enemy within,” he told Carlson on Thursday. “We have some very bad people, and those people are also very dangerous. They would like to destroy our country. They want our country to be a nice communist country or a fascist country in every possible way. And we have that.” you have to be careful.”

Harris campaign adviser Ian Sams responded to Trump's comments during an appearance on MSNBC's “Morning Joe” on Friday, calling the former president “completely consumed by his grievances.”

“I mean, think about the contrast between these two candidates,” Sams said. “There's Donald Trump talking about sending a prominent Republican to the firing squad, and Vice President Harris talking about sending one to her Cabinet. That’s the difference in this race.”

Karoline Leavitt, Trump's spokeswoman, claimed Friday that Trump's words were taken out of context.

“President Trump has stated CLEARLY that warmongers like Liz Cheney are quick to start wars and send other Americans to fight them rather than go into battle themselves,” Leavitt wrote on X.

ABC News' Lalee Ibssa, Soorin Kim, Kelsey Walsh and Oren Oppenheim contributed to this report.