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When Marjorie Taylor Greene first came to Congress, it is fair to say, she was viewed as something of a kook.
She indulged in conspiracy theories and repeated Q’Anon quackery, which she later acknowledged was a mistake.
But now MTG has evolved into President Trump’s most vociferous critic – which is especially noticeable in a party that follows their leader at almost every turn.
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The Georgia congresswoman, an ultra-conservative, still says she likes Trump, but she’s largely in the business of denouncing him on various issues. And that hasn’t exactly gone unnoticed.
When you spend a little time with Marjorie, you quickly realize that she’s smarter than her media image and a shrewd practitioner of the political game.
After she was elected, Greene faced a censure vote for having “repeatedly fanned the flames of racism, antisemitism, LGBTQ hate speech, Islamophobia, anti-Asian hate, xenophobia, and other forms of hatred.” She also “mocked the Holocaust” and said “Joe Biden is Hitler.”
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R) speaks alongside former US President and 2024 presidential hopeful Donald Trump at a campaign event in Rome, Georgia, on March 9, 2024. (ELIJAH NOUVELAGE/AFP via Getty Images)
But the Democratic member pushing the resolution withdrew it at the last minute. Greene, though, was not put on any committees.
The media and political community started taking her more seriously when she became a key ally of Kevin McCarthy and helped get him elected House speaker, despite rumors that he might quit the race.
“That was something that the media kept spinning around,” she told me on “Media Buzz.” “They were trying to say that Kevin McCarthy would drop out or that the conference was going to pull away. Absolutely not. And President Trump really helped with that.”
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She held up the phone when Trump said he wanted to talk with another Republican, Matt Rosedale, who refused to take the call.
Trump “was angry,” Greene told me. “He yelled at me on the House floor, telling me, don’t you ever do this. I was so surprised. I couldn’t understand. I was holding out my phone, saying, it’s President Trump, he wants to speak with you.”
Greene couldn’t save McCarthy when he was deposed, and she was on her own again.
Now the New York Times is portraying her as part of a growing MAGA divide.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) gestures while speaking as United States Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle testifies before the House Oversight and Accountability Committee during a hearing at the Rayburn House Office Building on July 22, 2024, in Washington, DC. (Kent Nishimura/Getty Images)
Greene has been pushing for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files. And a Trump official made it known that would be viewed as a hostile act.
MTG told the Times that she called a top White House aide.
“I told them, ‘You didn’t get me elected. I do not work for you; I work for my district.’ We aren’t supposed to just be whipped on our votes because they’re telling us what to do with this scary threat, or saying ‘We’ll primary you,’ or that we won’t get invited to the White House events.”
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Her attitude: “[Expletive] you.”
Greene has also challenged the president on foreign policy, saying she still believes in the concept of America First. Proudly proclaiming herself to be a Christian nationalist, she was the first Hill Republican to accuse Israel of genocide: “You can’t un-see dead children. That’s not fake. It’s not war propaganda.”
She is also an ardent critic of federal funding for Ukraine and voted against aid packages, despite Trump’s new support for the sovereign country invaded by Russia. Greene not only says taxpayer dollars shouldn’t be used to fund foreign wars, but she has clashed with Speaker Mike Johnson, attempting to oust him for depending on Democratic votes to pass Ukrainian aid.
Greene, who has also opposed the White House on artificial intelligence, is clearly enjoying her newfound independence. She posted this: “If you tell the base of people, who support you, of deep state treasonous crimes, and rich powerful elite evil cabals, then you must take down every enemy of The People.”
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., talks as President Joe Biden delivers his first State of the Union address on March 1, 2022. (J. Scott Applewhite, Pool, File/AP Photo)
Otherwise, “the base will turn and there’s no going back.”
It’s not that MTG still doesn’t say wacky things. After the murder of Charlie Kirk, she called for a “national divorce” in which the country’s red states would secede from the blue states. How exactly would that work?
“There is nothing left to talk about with the left. They hate us,” she said.
MTG’s boyfriend is Brian Glenn, chief White House correspondent for Real America’s Voice, who usually asks the president friendly questions (and chided Volodymyr Zelensky for not wearing a suit). She was married to her ex-husband for 27 years before he filed for divorce.
Whatever her ambitions, she recently passed up potential runs for governor and the Senate.
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“One day,” she says, “I might just run without the blessing from the good ole boys club or the out-of-state consulting leeches or even without the blessing of my favorite president.”
In the meantime, a lower profile is not exactly in the cards.
