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Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Back issues
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Greene Relishes Freedom After Being Booted From House Committees

Responding to the House’s decision to strip her from her committee assignments, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene said not sitting on the budget and education committees will give her more time to build national support.

(CN) — Responding to the House’s decision to strip her from her committee assignments, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene said not sitting on the budget and education committees will give her more time to build national support.

Speaking at a press conference held outside the Capitol Friday, the Republican representing the northwest corner of Georgia first said the removal from the two committees “stripped my voters of having representation.” But then Greene shifted her tone to say the committee assignments would have been a “waste of my time” and “now I have a lot of free time on my hands.”

The extra time, she said, would allow her to direct her attention off Capitol Hill and meet more people across the nation.

“I can talk to more people and make connections and build a huge amount of support that I've already got started from people who want to put America first and don't care about party lines,” Greene said.

She also said the Republican base is still loyal to former President Donald Trump.

On Thursday night, the House voted to remove her from the House budget and education committees. Democrats said the move was necessary to rebut the conspiratorial and violent language Greene voice in the past because the Republican leadership failed to properly act.

Republicans said during the debate over Greene’s fate that the move was a precedent-upending move that would crack open the ability for the majority to edit the minority party’s committee picks.

Greene has previously embraced QAnon, a baseless conspiracy theory that says Trump was fighting a cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles, saying in an interview last July that it had “patriotic sentiment.” She also expressed support for violence against Democratic lawmakers such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Of the 11 Republicans who joined all House Democrats in voting to strip her committee assignments, Greene said “that is something that our leader should be very upset about” because the “big betrayal” could cost the GOP the 2022 midterm elections.

She also said she felt freed after addressing the House on Thursday and saying she “believed things that were wrong” in the past.  

“I seriously feel blessed by God because I got to do it on a world stage,” Greene said.

Scott Hogan, executive director of the Democratic Party of Georgia, said Greene tried to “rewrite her own history” during her speech in the House and the press conference showed the remorseless lawmaker doubling down on dangerous ideology and divisive rhetoric.

“Meanwhile, Georgia Republicans like Brian Kemp continue to enable her, apparently willing to let her drag them down with her extremism,” Hogan said. “They represent exactly what's wrong with today's GOP."

Earlier Friday morning, Greene tweeted she woke up “literally laughing” as she thought about what Democrats had done to her. The House committees are controlled by Democratic lawmakers anyway, she said.

“This is why I voted yes,” Illinois Congressman Adam Kinzinger tweeted in response. “There is no remorse here for her past comments. Just a huge desire to be famous.”

Kinzinger was one of the 11 Republicans to break with their party and support the resolution to remove Greene from her committees.

“Also waking up ‘literally laughing’ is not normal,” Kinzinger wrote in a follow-up tweet.

Follow @jcksndnl
Categories / Government, National, Politics

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