Indiana GOP chairman defends vote and pushes back on Jan. 6 resolution coverage

Kyle Hupfer, the RNC's general counsel, defends vote for resolution.

Indiana Republican Party Chairman Kyle Hupfer defended the national Republican Party's voice vote resolution to censure Representatives Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois Friday at its winter meeting in Salt Lake City.

A portion of the larger resolution says "Representatives Cheney and Kinzinger are participating in a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse, and they are both utilizing their past professed political affiliation to mask Democrat abuse of prosecutorial power for partisan purposes..."

In an interview with IMPORTANTVILLE, Hupfer, who supported the resolution and is the RNC’s general counsel, said the resolution's content had been reported without context by other outlets—a charge RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel echoed on Twitter.

“What the resolution is getting at is people who are not in any way, shape, or form involved for January 6, were not in Washington, DC, committed no crimes, and are now being investigated without checks and balances from Republicans in the House,” he said.

“I am appalled and disgusted with the folks who went into the Capitol,” he told IMPORTANTVILLE. “They should be prosecuted. It's completely inappropriate. But this commission is going well beyond that to folks who had nothing to do with it. And Kinzinger and Cheney are just willing pawns in that, giving an appearance of Republican participation when the reality is there is no Republican participation.”

The resolution came the same day former Vice President Mike Pence told the Federalist Society in a Florida speech that “Trump is wrong,” to have said that he could have overturned the 2020 election results.

Indiana RNC Delegate John Hammond III told IMPORTANTVILLE he was a ‘no’ vote on the resolution.

“We need more Republicans, not fewer,” he said. “These kinds of matters should be dealt with by the Republican voters of their districts. The political cross currents and views within our party on this issue are many and varied; but the resolution of censure is an unnecessary distraction in a year where we need to be fully focused on winning back control of the US Congress.”

Hammond’s fellow Indiana RNC delegate Anne Hathaway did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

This is a developing story.