Remembering Richard B. Cheney, a vice president obsessed with accumulating executive power decades before Trump's rapid march toward autocracy

Nov. 4, 2025

Former Vice President Richard B. Cheney served under President George W. Bush (R). Together, they expanded executive powers and the surveillance state in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The nominal checks on those powers were no match for the swift power accumulation during the first year of Donald Trump's second term. Cheney died on Monday. He was 84 years old.

Further Reading :

• Opinion : The ironies of Dick Cheney [The Washington Post]
  Nov. 4, 2025 — His long journey from lowly doorkeeper to the most powerful vice president ever.
• Editorial : Cheney's defense of indefensible torture [Tampa Bay Times]
  Dec. 15, 2014 — Dick Cheney managed to add to the damage he has caused to America's image and influence with a deplorable defense of the CIA's torture tactics over the weekend.
• EDITORIAL : Mr. Cheney's Imperial Presidency [The New York Times]
  Dec. 23, 2005 — George W. Bush has quipped several times during his political career that it would be so much easier to govern in a dictatorship. Apparently he never told his vice president that this was a joke.

Key Words :

• Donald H. Rumsfeld
• George W. Bush
• Richard B. Cheney