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Tag Archives: congresswoman
Congresswoman Greene rises in GOP
WASHINGTON (AP) — Marjorie Taylor Greene took her seat directly behind Republican House leader Kevin McCarthy, a proximity to power for the firebrand congresswoman that did not go unnoticed, as he unveiled the House GOP’s midterm election agenda in Pennsylvania.
Days later, she appeared on stage warming up the crowd for Donald Trump, when the former president rallied voters in Michigan to cast ballots for Republicans, including for control of Congress.
Once shunned as a political pariah for her extremist rhetoric, the Georgia congresswoman who spent her first term in the House stripped of institutional power by Democrats is being celebrated by Republicans and welcomed into the GOP fold. If Republicans win the House majority in the November election, Greene is poised to become an influential player shaping the GOP agenda, an agitator with clout.
“No. 1, we need to impeach Joe Biden. No. 2, We need to impeach Secretary Mayorkas. And No. 3, we should impeach Merrick Garland,” Greene told The Associated Press outside the U.S. Capitol. Alejandro Mayorkas is the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and Garland the attorney general.
Scolding the media for having been “wrong about me” from the start, she said those who know better “take me very seriously.”
“I’m going to be a strong legislator and I’ll be a very involved member of Congress,” she predicted. “I know how to work inside, and I know how to work outside. And I’m looking forward to doing that.”
This is the outlook for the Republican Party in the Trump era, the normalizing of once fringe figures into the highest ranks of political power. It’s a sign of the GOP’s rightward drift that Greene’s association with extremists and nationalists, violent rhetoric and remarks about Jewish people have found a home in elected office. Her ascent brings into focus the challenge ahead for McCarthy, whose GOP ranks are filling with far-right political stars with the potential to play an oversized role in setting the policies, priorities and tone of the new Congress.
“I’ve said for a long time there’s a battle for the heart and soul of the Republican Party,” said Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, the No. 2 Democrat in the House, at a briefing ahead of the midterm elections.
When the congresswoman says outlandish things — as she did at the Trump rally earlier this month claiming “Democrats want Republicans dead, and they’ve already started the killings” — few Republican leaders dare a public or private rebuke of such incendiary language. In this case, she was exaggerating two local incidents involving politics, one that ended tragically in a fatality.
Greene’s political currency stretches beyond her massive social media following and her ability to rake in sizable sums from donors. Her proximity to Trump makes her a force that cannot be ignored by what’s left of her mainstream GOP colleagues.
McCarthy’s allowance for Greene to sit front and center with leadership for the campaign rollout was not by accident but design. The Republican lawmakers in attendance celebrated her presence, calling it a sign of the GOP’s “big tent” that welcomes all comers. But Greene’s arrival also signaled a stark normalizing of the most extreme elements in the Republican Party.
Longtime political strategist Rick Wilson, a former Republican who left the party in the Trump era, calls Greene’s brand of politics “government by trolling” that marks a dangerous new era for the GOP and will make it difficult to govern. McCarthy is in line to become House speaker if Republicans regain the majority.
“No matter what the trolling part of the Republican caucus does, you can’t ever satisfy them,” said Wilson, now at the Lincoln Project.
With the departure of the last vestiges of the anti-Trump wing of the House GOP — Liz Cheney defeated by a primary opponent and Adam Kinzinger deciding to step down rather than seek reelection — “that’s it,” Wilson said.
Greene swept onto the national stage in the 2020 election, catapulted forward even before she took office. As the lawmaker-elect from northwest Georgia, she attended a key organizing meeting at the Trump White House as lawmakers laid plans to object to the certification of Joe Biden’s election on Jan. 6, 2021. When she arrived to be sworn into Congress, she wore a “Trump Won” face mask.
Democrats moved swiftly and unequivocally to reprimand Greene, voting to strip her of congressional committee assignments over her incendiary rhetoric, including trafficking in volatile conspiracy theories. Greene drew rebuke from her own party a few months later for comparing mandatory COVID-19 face masks to the treatment of Jewish people by Nazi Germany.
While some have tried to compare Greene to outspoken far-left lawmakers, it became clear even to Republican leaders that Greene stood in a category of her own.
At that time, McCarthy called her comments about the Holocaust “wrong” and “appalling.” Greene later apologized.
In many ways, Greene’s arrival in the House traces the arc of the Republican Party’s rightward evolution from the Newt Gingrich revolution that brought conservatives to power in the 1994 election, to the “tea party” Republicans that regained the House majority in 2010.
Jack Kingston, a former Republican congressman who rose during those earlier eras, said McCarthy was smart in welcoming Greene to unfurl the House GOP’s “Commitment to America” last month.
“He’s got to work with her, and he knows that,” Kingston said.
“Getting Marjorie Taylor Greene on board is very important,” he said. “If you don’t bring everybody in the tent, they’re going to find their own niche.”
In the interview, Greene said she is certain she will be reinstated on her congressional committees if Republicans win the majority, eyeing the House Oversight panel, and is talking to leadership about other opportunities in the new Congress.
Not only does Greene want to impeach Biden and Cabinet officials, she is eager to conduct investigations, including into the origins of COVID-19.
Last month, Greene unveiled legislation that is another priority — her bill to prohibit some gender reassignment procedures on minors — flanked by a dozen Republican lawmakers and leaders in the conservative movement. Many of them praised the congresswoman for her work.
“I want to thank Marjorie Taylor Greene — who is soon to get her full legislative powers back, by the way,” said Matt Schlapp, chairman of the Conservative Political Action Committee, who hugged her afterward.
“If this is the type of thing that you’re going to have the courage to do, I think that’s something everybody needs to understand,” Schlapp said.
McCarthy and Greene appear to have come to an understanding that they need each other. The leader needs Greene to come into the GOP fold rather than throw rocks from outside. She needs McCarthy’s blessing to regain committee assignments, enabling her to participate more fully in Congress and put her imprint on legislation.
At the Pennsylvania event McCarthy batted away questions about his ability to govern if Republicans win the majority.
“Name me one person in the conference that is opposed to this,” he said afterward of their platform. “Is that a difference? Yes.”
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Follow AP for full coverage of the midterms at https://apnews.com/hub/2022-midterm-elections
A judge ruled that Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene can run for re-election for her seat
“Judge Beaudrot issued his Initial Decision on May 6, 2022, finding that Challengers have failed to prove their case by a preponderance of the evidence and that Respondent is qualified to be a candidate for Representative for Georgia’s 14th Congressional District. Judge Beaudrot’s Initial Decision and Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law are hereby adopted,” Raffensperger said in his decision.
A group of Georgia voters launched a legal effort to disqualify Greene from running for reelection because of her alleged role in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.
Greene, 47, had been accused of frequently using language to incite violence at the U.S. Capitol, including referring to efforts to challenge the results of the 2020 presidential election as “our 1776 moment.” The conservative lawmaker denies that she played a role in the event, which led to the deaths of five people and injuries to 140 members of law enforcement.
While testifying in April about her alleged role in the attack, Greene said she could not remember whether she urged then-President Donald Trump to impose martial law as a way to remain in power.
“I don’t recall,” the lawmaker said in response to questioning by an attorney representing the plaintiffs in the case.
Free Speech for People, a national election and campaign finance reform group, filed the challenge in March with the Georgia secretary of state’s office, alleging that Greene, who has built a reputation as one of Trump’s most fervent supporters, helped facilitate the violent insurrection aimed at preventing Congress from confirming Joe Biden’s win.
The organization expressed its disappointment in the judge’s ruling, calling it a betrayal of the 14th Amendment.
“This decision betrays the fundamental purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Insurrectionist Disqualification Clause and gives a pass to political violence as a tool for disrupting and overturning free and fair elections,” the organization said in a statement Friday. “We urge Secretary Raffensperger to take a fresh look at the evidence presented in the case and reject the judge’s recommendation. Marjorie Taylor Greene helped facilitate the January 6 insurrection, and under the Constitution, she is disqualified from future office.”
The challenge claimed that Greene’s actions violated a provision of the 14th Amendment and thus made her ineligible to run for reelection.
The rarely cited provision states that no one can serve in Congress “who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress … to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same.”
The amendment was ratified shortly after the Civil War. The provision in question was meant to prevent lawmakers who fought for the Confederacy from being reelected to Congress.
Any Georgia voter eligible to vote for a candidate can challenge that candidate’s qualifications by filing a written complaint within two weeks after the deadline for qualifying, according to state law. The secretary of state has to notify the candidate of the challenge before requesting a hearing before an administrative law judge. The judge goes on to hold a hearing before presenting findings to the secretary of state, who then determines whether the candidate is qualified.
Marjorie Taylor Greene: Judge appears likely to allow Jan. 6 candidacy challenge against congresswoman
Federal Judge Amy Totenberg of the Northern District of Georgia said during a lengthy hearing that she has “significant questions and concerns” about a recent ruling in a similar case, which blocked the same challenge against Rep. Madison Cawthorn, a North Carolina Republican.
A group of Georgia voters, backed by a coalition of constitutional scholars and liberal activists, lodged the challenge against Greene last month with state election officials. Greene then filed her own lawsuit in federal court, asking Totenberg to shut down the state-level proceedings.
Totenberg said she will issue a ruling next week, likely on Monday. That’s two days before a state judge is scheduled to hold a hearing on the underlying question of whether Greene engaged in or aided the January 6, 2021, insurrection and whether that disqualifies her from office.
James Bopp Jr., a conservative lawyer who is representing Greene, said the challenge was “50 pages of newspaper articles, hearsay and political hyperbole.” He warned during the court hearing that if the challenge is allowed to proceed, it will embolden liberal groups to try to disqualify former President Donald Trump from running for reelection in 2024.
The hearing Friday was the latest chapter in the seemingly elusive efforts to hold prominent GOP officials responsible for January 6, which are playing out in a major congressional inquiry, a federal criminal probe that has largely focused on the rioters themselves and civil litigation.
The 14th Amendment of the US Constitution prohibits officeholders from returning to elected positions if they supported an insurrection. The challengers claim that Greene can’t run for reelection because she “aided” the January 6 insurrection, allegedly planned with protest organizers and “encouraged” the violence that disrupted the Electoral College certification.
They cited Greene’s own comments, including one video where she explicitly said she opposed the peaceful transfer of power to President Joe Biden “because he did not win this election.”
Lawyers for Greene say she isn’t an insurrectionist and that disqualifying her would violate her First Amendment rights. She previously told CNN that she had “never encouraged political violence and never will.” A spokesman said she wasn’t involved in planning any protests on January 6.
High-stakes showdown
The anti-Greene challenge was brought by the same groups that unsuccessfully tried to remove Cawthorn from the GOP primary ballot in North Carolina. A Trump-appointed federal judge shut down that challenge, ruling that a Civil War amnesty law passed in 1872 still applies and therefore shielded Cawthorn from being disqualified over his role in the January 6 insurrection.
Cawthorn has denied any wrongdoing regarding January 6 and says he isn’t an insurrectionist.
Some of the leading experts on the Constitution’s “disqualification clause” criticized that judge’s conclusion. And on Friday, so did Totenberg, the Obama-appointed judge in Greene’s case.
“I don’t think that the Amnesty Act likely was prospective,” Totenberg said, siding with the challengers, who said the 1872 law was retrospective and didn’t protect future insurrectionists.
Bryan Sells, attorney for the challengers, who are backed by the legal advocacy group Free Speech For People, piled on, saying, “The absurdity of his argument shines through like a beacon.”
Greene hired the same lawyer, Bopp, who prevailed in the Cawthorn case. He noted on Friday that no one has been charged with insurrection related to January 6, “despite all the resources of the Justice Department and FBI.” He also said removing Greene from the ballot would be akin to “stripping voters of their right to vote and upending democracy right before an election.”
The GOP firebrand filed the suit against Republican Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, whose office oversees parts of the candidacy challenge process. Raffensperger was infamously on the receiving end of a phone call where Trump pressured him to “find” enough votes to undo Joe Biden’s victory in Georgia. Raffensperger refused to go along.
In the federal case, Raffensperger is represented by Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr, who is also a Republican. The state officials want the judge to dismiss Greene’s lawsuit, which would allow the candidacy challenge to proceed in front of a state administrative judge next week.
“You have an ongoing proceeding that is in compliance with state law, and we would argue in compliance with federal law,” Russell Willard of the Georgia attorney general’s office said Friday, urging Totenberg to “allow the ongoing, and pending, state proceeding to continue to fruition.”
A hearing in the underlying disqualification case is scheduled for Wednesday in Atlanta, where a state administrative judge will determine if Greene is qualified to appear on the GOP primary ballot. The election is May 25, and counties will start mailing absentee ballots later this month.
The administrative judge already rejected a request for Greene to testify at a deposition. The challengers also demanded that she turn over a wide array of documents related to the 2020 election and January 6, including any emails she may have exchanged with rally organizers or members of extremist groups that were involved in the attack. Greene opposes these efforts.
Democratic congresswoman carjacked at gunpoint in Philadelphia
“(On) Wednesday afternoon, at around 2:45 p.m., Congresswoman Scanlon was carjacked at gunpoint in FDR Park following a meeting at that location,” her spokesperson Lauren Cox told CNN in a statement.
“The Congresswoman was physically unharmed. She thanks the Philadelphia Police Department for their swift response, and appreciates the efforts of both the Sergeant at Arms in D.C. and her local police department for coordinating with Philly PD to ensure her continued safety,” the statement read.
Authorities recovered the vehicle belonging to the congresswoman in Delaware and took five suspects into custody, Senior Corporal Jason Hatchell of the Delaware State Police told CNN Wednesday night. Scanlon’s vehicle was recovered near a public gym in Newark, Hatchell said.
Scanlon, a Democrat, has served in the House since 2018. Her district includes part of Philadelphia and its suburbs. She currently sits on the House Judiciary Committee, as well as the House Rules Committee and the House Administration Committee.
According to a statement from the Philadelphia Police Department provided to CNN on Wednesday evening, “US Congress Woman Mary Gay Scanlon was walking to her car when she was approached. … The armed males approached the victim and demanded the keys to her vehicle — a blue 2017 Acura MDX. The victim handed over the keys to her vehicle, at which point one of the two offenders drove off in the victim’s vehicle; and was last seen on the 2000 Block of Pattisson Ave. The second offender entered a second dark-colored SUV and followed Offender #1. Several personal and work items were also taken with the vehicle.”
The police department also said it is working alongside the FBI, which has taken the lead in the investigation.
“I am relieved that Congresswoman Scanlon was not physically injured, and my thoughts are with her during this difficult time,” said Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw. “The PPD will continue to provide any support needed in this case and will work diligently alongside our federal partners to assist in bringing those responsible to justice.”
This story has been updated with additional developments Wednesday.
Jimmy Kimmel Unloads on QAnon Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene for Harassing Parkland Survivor
On Thursday night, Jimmy Kimmel moved away from his favorite target, the coup-complicit congressman Ted Cruz, and toward the Q-complicit Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican congresswoman from Georgia who subscribes to QAnon—a baseless, batshit-insane conspiracy theory positing that Donald Trump is a messianic figure battling a cabal of sex-trafficker pedophiles comprised of some of the biggest names in Hollywood and the Democratic Party (this despite the fact that Trump palled around with notorious pedophile Jeffrey Epstein).
“The chair of the RNC, Ronna McDaniel…tried to distance the party from QAnon. She said it’s beyond fringe and dangerous,” explained Kimmel during his late-night monologue. “QAnon is so fringe, in fact, Republicans in the House just put their screwiest, Q-iest member on the Education and Labor Committee—that is Marjorie Taylor Greene from Georgia.”
Then, Kimmel introduced his audience to Greene, who has never met a bonkers conspiracy theory she didn’t love.
“If you don’t know who this person is, I wish I didn’t too. She is the lady who, among other things, called for Nancy Pelosi’s execution; called for Joe Biden’s impeachment on his first day in office; and she believes our former governor here in California, Jerry Brown, used space lasers to set the wildfires here. She saw the Austin Powers movie and thought it was a documentary, I guess,” cracked Kimmel.
Greene is also a COVID skeptic who refused to wear a mask in a secure, tightly-packed room with other congresspeople during the storming of the U.S. Capitol; believes in Pizzagate, the debunked theory that Democrats were operating a child sex-trafficking ring under a D.C. pizza shop; said the elections of Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib to Congress represented an “Islamic invasion of our government”; called the neo-Nazi rally in Charlottesville an “inside job”; pushed the anti-Semitic conspiracy theory that “Zionist supremacists” are trying to replace whites with migrants; has repeatedly questioned the 9/11 attacks; and called the Christchurch, Sandy Hook, and Parkland shootings “false flags.” And again, she supported executing Democratic leaders.
“Marjorie also called some of the terrible school shootings ‘false flag operations,’ meaning the perpetrators weren’t who we think they were,” offered Kimmel. “And here she is stalking and harassing a child not long after he watched his friends get slaughtered in school.”
He then threw to a video of Greene trailing David Hogg, a Parkland school shooting survivor (and teenager), barking at him and branding him a “coward.”
“The coward she was yelling at there is a teenager named David Hogg. He’s an activist. She referred to him online as ‘Little Hitler.’ I wonder how it would go over with the Fox News and Ted Cruz crew if Nancy Pelosi called for Marjorie Taylor Greene to be executed and called a teenage kid Hitler? You think they’d have anything to say?” asked Kimmel. “Well, it was the other way around, and guess what? Most of them have nothing to say. Instead, they assigned her to the education committee—hoping she would get one? I don’t know.”
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: Capitol rioter charged with threatening to ‘assassinate’ New York congresswoman
Garret Miller of Texas faces five criminal charges stemming from the Capitol insurrection, including trespassing offenses and making death threats. Miller allegedly tweeted, “assassinate AOC,” according to court documents.
He also said the police officer who fatally shot a Trump supporter during the attack “deserves to die” and won’t “survive long” because it’s “huntin[g] season.”
Prosecutors said in newly released court documents that Miller posted extensively on social media before and during the attack, saying a “civil war could start” and “next time we bring the guns.”
He was arrested on Wednesday, according to the Justice Department. Federal prosecutors are asking a judge to keep him in jail pending trial, and a detention hearing is scheduled for Monday.
Clint Broden, a lawyer for Miller, told CNN Saturday that his client “certainly regrets what he did.”
“He did it in support of former President (Donald) Trump, but regrets his actions. He has the support of his family, and a lot of the comments are viewed in context as really sort of misguided political hyperbole. Given the political divide these days, there is a lot of hyperbole,” Broden said.
This story has been updated with comments from Miller’s attorney.