By Ben Hooper
Feb. 3 (UPI) — A cat who went missing from her owner’s Maine home seven years ago will be reunited soon with her family after turning up more than 1,400 miles away in Florida.
Denise Cilley, of Chesterville, said her family’s pet, Ashes, was strictly an indoor cat when the feline escaped from the house in August 2015.
Cilley said her family searched for the then-1-year-old cat, but there was no sign of Ashes. She said the family eventually came to believe she had been taken by a fox or other predator.
Cilley said she was initially confused when she recently received a phone call from a veterinarian in Longwood, Fla.
“I live in Maine. We don’t have a cat in Florida,” Cilley recalled telling the vet, according to an interview with Patch.
The veterinarian told Cilley the feline had a microchip from the Franklin County Animal Shelter that contained her contact information, and after receiving a description of the animal, she realized the cat must be the long-lost Ashes.
A mutual friend helped Cilley connect with Janet Williams, a former Maine resident who moved to Florida and founded the Pixel Fund and Adore Pet Rescue groups.
“They called me because I do have connections in the rescue community,” Williams said. “And there’s a fairly well-organized rescue network up and down the East Coast I could tap into.”
The veterinarian determined Ashes had health issues including an upper respiratory infection, dental disease, some missing teeth and a scabby coat.
A GoFundMe page was started to raise funds for Ashes’ veterinary care and travel costs.
Williams, who is fostering Ashes until the feline can return home, and Cilley have arranged for a Southwest Airlines employee to fly the cat home once she is cleared by the veterinarian.
Cilley said she has no clues as to how Ashes ended up so far from home.
“We have no idea,” Cilley said. “Maybe somebody found her in Maine, thought she was a stray, took her in and moved to Florida, and she got out and couldn’t find her way home.”
“This was January 6th,” the Wyoming Republican wrote. “This is not ‘legitimate political discourse.'”
The move to censure Cheney and Kinzinger, of Illinois, is unprecedented, and marks the first time the national party has rebuked an incumbent congressional Republican — much less two — with a formal censure backed by its members. When the resolution was introduced Friday to all 168 RNC members, it was described as a motion “to no longer support [Cheney and Kinzinger] as members of the Republican Party.”
Despite the resolution’s passage, there were a few vocal opponents in the room Friday.
“I think the whole censure thing is a slippery slope. Are we going to censure Marc Short for showing up to testify before the committee? Are we going to censure Mike Pence if he cooperates?” said New Jersey committeeman Bill Palatucci, referring to the former vice president and his chief of staff, who recently met with the House Jan. 6 panel following a subpoena.
Prior to the vote, RNC members pushed to have the resolution watered down to remove language calling for Cheney and Kinzinger’s expulsion from the House GOP Conference — a strictly symbolic measure given that the party does not have the authority to decide who does or does not serve in Congress.
“Some people felt it was too harsh,” said Jonathan Barnett, a co-sponsor of the resolution and Arkansas committeeman.
Cheney and Kinzinger have both played active roles in the House select committee’s probe of Trump’s activities before and during the riot at the Capitol last January. Their status as the lone Republicans on the panel has drawn scorn from fellow GOP lawmakers and party officials who believe they are enabling an unfair investigation led by congressional Democrats.
“This is not about dissenting views. This is about them helping [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi,” said David Bossie, a Trump ally and national committeeman from Maryland, who drafted the original resolution seeking to oust Cheney and Kinzinger from the GOP caucus.
In a statement ahead of the resolution’s passage, Cheney said the punitive measure marked “a sad day for the party of Lincoln.”
Cheney’s team also criticized a separate deal struck by Wyoming GOP chairman Frank Eathorne and the national party that would enable the RNC to fund Cheney’s primary challenger, Harriet Hageman, using a longstanding party rule known as Rule 11. With help from high-profile donors, such as former President George W. Bush, Cheney recently reported a fundraising haul of more than $2 million over the final three months of 2021, giving her a significant edge over Hageman, who raised $443,000 over the same period.
“Frank Eathorne and the Republican National Committee are trying to assert their will and take away the voice of the people of Wyoming before a single vote has even been cast,” a Cheney spokesman said in a statement to CNN.
Palatucci said proponents of the deal to assist Hageman were likely emboldened by the overwhelming support they found among committee members for the censure of Cheney and Kinzinger.
“I think the censure thing was the secondary piece to lay the groundwork for the Rule 11 change,” he told CNN after the vote.
Several Republicans, including Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, the 2012 presidential nominee, have criticized the motion to censure Cheney and Kinzinger, who were among 10 House GOP lawmakers who voted to impeach Trump last year for his role in inciting the Capitol riot. .
“Shame falls on a party that would censure persons of conscience, who seek truth in the face of vitriol. Honor attaches to Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for seeking truth even when doing so comes at great personal cost,” Romney said in a tweet a few hours before Friday’s vote.
This story has been updated with additional reaction and details about the RNC resolution and vote Friday.
CNN’s Jeff Zeleny contributed to this report.
Be the first to comment