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WASHINGTON — House Democrats stripped committee assignments from a Georgia congresswoman who promoted the QAnon conspiracy, despite her plea Thursday not to “crucify me in the public square” and insistence that she now realizes the claims were far-fetched lies.
“School shootings are absolutely real,” said Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, repudiating some of her own outlandish assertions. “I also want to tell you, 9/11 absolutely happened. … I do not believe that it’s fake.”
The vote was 230-199, with 11 Republicans, none of them from Texas, joining a unified Democratic bloc in the rare public shunning of a colleague.
It should not be extraordinary for a member of Congress to publicly affirm the reality of tragedies like the Parkland school massacre and al-Qaeda’s attack on the Twin Towers and Pentagon. Greene, however, rose to political prominence after amplifying wild theories about a secret cabal of Satan-worshipping pedophiles within government and claims that gun control advocates staged massacres in order to undermine public support for the Second Amendment.
And while she averred that she no longer adheres to such theories, she refused to apologize for having done so in the past, instead depicting herself as the victim of “cancel culture” and comparing the news media to QAnon for entwining lies and truth together in ways that make it hard to tell the difference.
The comments left Democrats unpersuaded about her contrition.
Intent both on curbing the influence of a conspiracy theorist and on maximizing the embarrassment across the aisle, Democrats chastised Republicans for refusing to distance themselves from deranged and violent theories. They called it chilling that after denying the tragic realities of massacres at schools in Newtown, Conn., and Parkland, Fla., the GOP leadership assigned her to the education committee. And they refuted Greene’s claims that she’s had a change of heart.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer recalled that in January 2019, Greene endorsed a comment on social media that said the quickest way to remove Speaker Nancy Pelosi from power would be “a bullet to the head.”
He displayed an enormous poster of an image Greene posted on Facebook in September, two months before her election. In it, she’s pointing an AR-15 assault-style rifle toward three liberal congresswomen: Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.
It’s labeled “Squad’s worst nightmare.”
“Look at that image and tell me what message you think it sends,” Hoyer said. “These are clear threats to incite political violence” and that was “just months ago” — not in the distant past.
Minority leader Kevin McCarthy accused Democrats of meddling in the other party’s affairs in a way they will come to regret whenever they lose control of the House.
“They’re blinded by partisanship and politics,” he said, “unequivocally” condemning Greene’s past comments while also insisting that it’s improper to strip her of committee assignments for statements made before her election.
GOP leaders gave Greene extended time on the House floor. She insisted that she has rejected the QAnon cult since 2018, though Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., chairman of the Rules Committee, cited a comment she made while running for Congress last July: “I’ve only ever seen patriotic sentiment coming out of that source.”
Freshman Rep. Beth Van Duyne of Irving downplayed Greene’s remarks, accusing Democrats of punishing her “for comments that were made years before she was sworn in.”
Besides, she said, “Marjorie has apologized” — though Greene only expressed regret, carefully avoiding terms like “sorry” and projecting defiance as she boasted about the donations she’s received this week. “We will not back down. We will never give up!” she tweeted.
Still, said Van Duyne, “Marjorie acknowledged that QAnon is full of ‘lies’ and ‘misinformation’” and that “school shootings are ‘absolutely real.’ … It’s time for us — as a [GOP] conference and as a House — to acknowledge her remorse, to forgive her and to move forward.”
Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Tyler, accused Democrats of pursuing a “fanatical action” and warned of payback when Republicans regain power. “This is not a road to go down. … It won’t end well for either party,” he said.
Rep. Brian Babin of Woodville likewise warned that Republicans will feel an “obligation” to retaliate.
Greene received a standing ovation Wednesday night at a closed-door GOP caucus meeting — a fact that Democrats highlighted repeatedly, to justify their own move and jab at colleagues across the aisle.
On the House floor, Greene made no mention of harassing a student who became a gun control activist after surviving a school massacre, or the bizarre theory she promoted that a Jewish cabal used a space laser to spark California wildfires in order to clear room for a rail project.
Greene, wearing a mask with the words “Free Speech” on it, insisted that the mainstream media and liberal detractors have presented a one-sided portrait.
She’s a mom, a business owner, “a very hard worker” who’s never done drugs and always paid her taxes.
“I’m a very regular American” who was drawn to QAnon by a Facebook post that echoed her own doubts about allegations of “Russian collusion” in the 2016 election — itself a “conspiracy theory,” in her view, though the U.S. intelligence community has in fact concluded that Russia meddled on Trump’s behalf and worked with some of his top advisers.
“I was allowed to believe things that weren’t true. … That is absolutely what I regret,” Greene said, insisting that after a few months of reading and spouting QAnon theories, “I stopped believing it. … I walked away from those things.”
“I never once said during my entire campaign `QAnon.’ … These were words of the past, and these things do not represent me, they do not represent my district, and they do not represent my values,” she said.
Democrats poked holes in the claim, noting that despite her purported epiphany, she has continued to spread incendiary views. In 2019 she asserted that Pelosi should be executed for treason. Three days ago she referred to critics as pedophiles, echoing the QAnon narrative.
“Congresswoman Greene has said some crazy and offensive things,” Sen. John Cornyn said during a call with Texas news media during Thursday’s House debate. He called it a “false narrative” to say that she “somehow represents the Republican Party.”
Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has gone further than House Republicans in denouncing Greene. On Monday he called the “loony lies” that she has promoted a “cancer for the Republican Party.”
House Republicans did not defend Greene’s views, instead complaining that Democrats were hypocritically imposing punishment across the aisle while overlooking transgressions in their own ranks.
Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Pilot Point, called Greene’s remarks and actions “wrong” and “inflammatory” and argued that the House code of conduct cannot be applied until she took office.
Democrats, however, saw no sign that Greene has truly set aside views at odds with House norms.
“A member of Congress who has propagated dangerous conspiracies about, and harassed survivors of, tragic school shootings is not fit to serve on the committee that oversees America’s public schools,” Dallas Rep. Colin Allred said in a statement.
Greene called it hypocritical to bar her from committee work while allowing Democrats who defended Black Lives Matter protests against police violence to avoid any penalties.
“If this Congress is to tolerate members that condone riots that have hurt American people, attack police officers, occupied federal property, burned businesses and cities, but yet want to condemn me and crucify me in the public square for words that I said and I regret a few years ago, then I think we’re in a real big problem,” she said.