Cheney Denies Involvement as Primary Challenger Makes Damning Admission
Rep. Liz Cheney’s team denied involvement as Wyoming state Sen. Anthony Bouchard, a high-profile Republican primary challenger to Cheney, admitted Thursday that he impregnated a 14-year-old girl when he was 18.
Bouchard disclosed the relationship in a Facebook Live video to his supporters, outlining the situation.
“So, bottom line, it’s a story when I was young, two teenagers, girl gets pregnant,” he said.
“You’ve heard these stories before. She was a little younger than me, so it’s like the Romeo and Juliet story.”
Bouchard told the Casper Star-Tribune that he married the girl when she was 15 and he was 19 with her mother’s blessing.
The lawmaker said he was not charged with a crime in connection to the relationship, but the couple was pressured to abort the baby.
“I wasn’t going to do it, and neither was she,” he said.
“And there was pressure to have her banished from their family. Just pressure. Pressure to go hide somewhere.”
He continued, “And the only thing I could see as the right thing to do was to get married and take care of him.”
They got divorced about three years later and his ex-wife died by suicide at the age of 20.
“She had problems in another relationship. Her dad had committed suicide,” Bouchard said.
“After his ex-wife died, Bouchard said he continued to raise the couple’s son, Tony Raymond Bouchard, whom he briefly references in the video,” the Tribune reported.
Bouchard said he released the video because he wanted to get ahead of the story that he said an unnamed reporter and a “political opposition research company” were pushing forward with it.
“We know the company that started this investigation. It’s a political opposition research company. We know who they are. And then it turned into a U.K. media reporter, is who’s called me,” he said.
“They’ll stop at nothing, man, when you get in the lead and when you’re somebody that can’t be controlled, you’re somebody who works for the people. They’ll come after you. That’s why good people don’t run for office.”
Jeremy Adler, a spokesman for Cheney, told Fox News that Cheney’s team had “absolutely no involvement” in digging through Bouchard’s past.
Bouchard told supporters that he would stay in the Wyoming House race to replace Cheney, who was ousted from her leadership position earlier this month.
“Bring it on. I’m going to stay in this race,” he said.
“We’re going to continue to raise money because my record stands on its own.”
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