Greene ‘thrilled’ with outcome of US Speaker vote
>> As Republicans and Democrats booed her loudly on Wednesday when she called a snap vote on the House floor to oust Speaker Mike Johnson, Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene paused briefly to narrate the drama to viewers back home.
“This is the uniparty, for the American people watching,” Ms Greene sneered, peering over her glasses at her colleagues like a disappointed schoolteacher.
Ms Greene went on to take her shot at Mr Johnson and miss, an outcome that she knew was a certainty. The vote to kill her attempt to remove him was an overwhelming 359-43 — with all but 39 Democrats joining Republicans to block her and rescue the GOP speaker.
The move buoyed Mr Johnson, confirming his status as the leader of an unlikely bipartisan governing coalition in the House that Ms Greene considers the ultimate enemy.
And it isolated Ms Greene on Capitol Hill, putting her back where she was when she arrived in Washington three years ago: a provocateur and subject of derision who appears to revel in causing huge headaches for her colleagues.
“Hopefully, this is the end of the personality politics and the frivolous character assassination that has defined the 118th Congress,” Mr Johnson said after the vote.
The word “hopefully” was doing a lot of work.
If Ms Greene’s goals in Congress were to chair a powerful committee or to build up political capital to drive major policy initiatives — or if she had to worry about drawing a political challenger — this all would constitute a major problem for her.
But those have never been the incentives that have driven the gentle lady from Georgia, whose congressional career has been defined by delighting her base and stoking anger on the right more than legislative achievement or political pragmatism.
Ms Greene hails from a blood-red district where 68% of voters supported former president Donald Trump in 2020, allowing her to operate with relative impunity in Congress, without fear of a challenge from the right or left.
She has further insulated herself politically by donating vast sums to electing Republicans to the House, quietly backing her colleagues even as she picks fights many of them would rather avoid.
So even as it became clear over the past week that she would fail in her quest to depose the speaker, Ms Greene saw an upside in insisting on the exercise.
A vote would offer proof that Mr Johnson had made himself beholden to the Democrats — a dynamic that has been clear for months as he has partnered with them to pass a host of major bills, including one to send aid to Ukraine — and that many Republicans were going along with what she regarded as a betrayal of the party’s principles.
“I’m thrilled with the whole thing,” Ms Greene said later on Thursday, sounding upbeat after her spectacular defeat. “Even the booing from both sides — I fully expected it.”
Even if Ms Greene felt defeated or isolated, she would be exceedingly unlikely to acknowledge it. Her power derives in large part from her irrepressible attitude and her Trumpian instinct to double down rather than retreat in the face of failure.
On Wednesday evening, centre-leaning Republicans tried to create as much distance from her as they could, fearful that association with her theatrics would alienate voters in their districts turned off by the seemingly endless chaos in the House.
“All she wants is attention,” said Rep Carlos Gimenez. “Today, we shut her down. Our entire conference said, ‘Enough is enough — we don’t need to hear from her any more.’”
Rep. Mike Lawler referred repeatedly to Ms Greene as “Moscow Marjorie” as she dangled her threat to oust the speaker. “Moscow Marjorie has clearly gone off the deep end,” he said on Wednesday.
But if Ms Greene is now on an island in her party, she hasn’t been there long, and there’s likely a rescue boat en route to bring her back to the mainland.
Shortly after arriving in Congress in 2021, she was stripped of her committee assignments by Democrats — 11 Republicans voted with them — and was treated like a pariah by many in Washington.
But over the past two years, Ms Greene has been elevated by her party’s leaders, valued as a top adviser by former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, leaned on as a helpful fundraiser by vulnerable Republicans and publicly hailed as a dream teammate by centre-leaning lawmakers in her party.
Mr Trump, who had privately prodded Ms Greene to move on rather than pursue her vendetta against the speaker and manoeuvred to save Mr Johnson, made it clear she remains on his good side despite ignoring his advice. “He’s not mad at me at all,” Ms Greene said Thursday of the former president. “I talked to him plenty. He’s proud of me.”
She said she didn’t care much whether she was isolated or not. “If I’m on an island,” she said, “I’m doing exactly what I came here for.”
I’m thrilled with the whole thing. Even the booing from both sides — I fully expected it.
REP MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE, REFLECTING ON HER DEFEAT