Washington – The House will vote on a measure removing the controversial GOP congressman Marjorie Taylor Greene of her committee assignments, as House Democrats seek to punish the Republican legislature for a litany of inflammatory comments and force GOP members to condemn or defend her.
In social media posts and videos made before she was elected to Congress, Greene, a freshman from Georgia, embraced a slew of far-right conspiracy theories, including whether fatal school shootings had been staged. She was a supporter of QAnon’s fantastic conspiracy theory, also shared videos with anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim sentiments, and expressed support for violence against Democratic leaders in Congress.
House Democrats seized the newly surfaced messages and videos to demand that Republican leaders strip Greene of her seats on the House Budget Committee and the Education and Labor Committee. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy refused to do so, prompting Democratic leaders to push for a House floor resolution to remove her.
With the vote set for Thursday afternoon, the Democrats will force regular Republican members to say whether they think Greene should keep her positions in committees. Democrats, notably, have rejected her seat on the Education and Labor Committee, given Greene’s previous promotion of conspiracy theories related to the Parkland and Newtown shootings.
In a speech in the House before the vote, Greene said the 9/11 terrorist attacks occurred and she believes children deserve protection from school shootings.
“These are words from the past and these things don’t represent me, they don’t represent my district, and they don’t represent my values,” Greene said. However, she also equated the press with QAnon, saying the media was just as divided as the insidious conspiracy theories promoted by QAnon supporters.
McCarthy said in a statement Wednesday that he “unequivocally” condemned Greene’s earlier statements, but described the Democrats’ move to have her removed from committees as a seizure of power. Other Republicans have condemned Greene’s comments as well, but warned Democrats against setting a precedent in which the majority party dictates the minority party’s commission assignments.
At a lengthy gathering of the Republican Conference on Wednesday night, Greene expressed remorse for her previous comments and previous support for the QAnon conspiracy theory, according to two sources familiar with the meeting.
At the same meeting, Representative Liz Cheney an effort fended off to have her removed from her House GOP leadership role for her vote to impeach former President Donald Trump for instigating the attack on the Capitol. However, 61 GOP members voted to expel her from the leadership, indicating deep divisions within the Republican caucus over the direction of the party.
House Democrats suggested the resolution Call for the removal of Greene from committees at a House Rules Committee meeting earlier Wednesday, and a full-house vote on Thursday afternoon.
House GOP leaders’ refusal to exercise their authority to remove Greene from her committee assignments contrasts with their handling of a similar situation in 2019, when the party’s steering committee chose to delete then-Congressman Steve King from his committees on comments defending white supremacy.
Congressional Democrats have sought to tie House Republicans to Greene’s extremist views. In a statement on Wednesday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office referred to McCarthy as “Q-CA,” calling him the QAnon Congressman from California.