What Happens When Attention Seeking Eclipses Policy Making
In a surprising turn of events, Marjorie Taylor Greene, the controversial junior representative from Georgia, announced her resignation from Congress, effective January 5. Greene’s tenure, marked by her polarizing presence rather than significant legislative achievements, has sparked both intrigue and criticism. Despite serving nearly three years, Greene’s impact on national policy has been minimal; she did not sponsor any major legislation and spent two years without committee assignments after being removed due to incendiary remarks that included promoting conspiracy theories and advocating violence against political opponents. Her resignation comes in the wake of a public falling out with former President Donald Trump, who labeled her a “ranting lunatic” and suggested he would support a challenger in her upcoming primary, leaving her political future uncertain.
Greene’s abrupt decision has drawn attention not only for its timing but also for its implications within the GOP. Known for her fervent loyalty to Trump, Greene’s fortunes have been closely tied to his approval. Her resignation announcement, in which she expressed a desire to protect her family and her district from a contentious primary, underscores the precarious nature of loyalty in Trump’s political landscape. Despite her belief that she could have won the primary, Greene recognized the potential for a bitter fight that could harm her standing and influence. This resignation marks a significant moment in a political career characterized by attention-seeking antics and controversial statements, including her infamous claims about various conspiracy theories that have drawn ire from both sides of the aisle.
Throughout her time in Washington, Greene has become a symbol of the performative politics that have increasingly defined the Republican Party. Her rise was fueled by a staunch alignment with Trump, which initially granted her a platform within the party, even leading to her reinstatement on committees after the GOP regained the House majority. However, as her relationship with Trump soured, Greene faced the reality that her political capital was dwindling. The resignation reflects not only her personal struggles within the party but also highlights the broader challenges faced by GOP members navigating the shifting dynamics of loyalty and power in the Trump era. As the Republican Party braces for the 2024 elections, Greene’s departure raises questions about the future of her brand of politics and the ongoing influence of Trump within the party.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnpbsTRkoW4
A
junior member
of Congress from Georgia announced her resignation last night, ending a brief tenure in the House that produced, well, not a whole lot.
Marjorie Taylor Greene
is no legislative powerhouse, and in the grand sweep of American history, her five years as a U.S. representative will be a mere blip. She wrote no major laws and had little discernible impact on national policy. (For two of those years, she did not serve on a single House committee, having
been booted
from her assignments in a bipartisan vote because of comments she made prior to serving in Congress that, among other things, promoted anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and the execution of Democratic lawmakers.)
Yet if that had been all there was to say about Greene, then her abrupt decision to quit in the middle of her third term would not have made
international
headlines
. In her short time in Washington, she has become one of the most well-known House members, embodying a performative style of politics that rewards attention seeking over policy making. Her star power has also been tied to—and as it turned out, was completely dependent on—her fervent support for Donald Trump.
The president withdrew that support last week, calling Greene a “ranting lunatic” and a “traitor” after she broke with him over the GOP’s strategy on health care and his ties to
Jeffrey Epstein
. He said that he would back “the right person” to challenge her in a primary next year. Greene—who during Trump’s
first term replied
to a Facebook follower asking if “we get to hang” Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton over their support of the Iran nuclear deal
by stating
, “The stage is being set”—accused the president of jeopardizing her safety with his rhetoric. Last night, she announced that she would resign from the House on January 5. “I have too much self-respect and dignity,” Greene says in a
video
she posted on X. “I love my family way too much, and I do not want my sweet district to have to endure a hurtful and hateful primary against me by the president that we all fought for.”
[
Read: Four simple questions for Marjorie Taylor Greene
]
Greene professed confidence that she would have won her primary anyway (and with it, the general election in a deeply Republican district). But she said a victory might not be worth much, because Republicans will “likely” lose their House majority, and she would have found herself expected to defend Trump from a Democratic impeachment attempt after he spent millions trying “to destroy me.”
The president welcomed her departure, telling
ABC News
that it “was great news for the country.” Trump told reporters earlier today: “I said, ‘Go your own way,’ and once I left her, she resigned because she would never have survived a primary. But I think she’s a nice person.”
“Honestly shocked,” one former White House official texted us in response to the news. “Makes me question how much she truly cares, it seems like a surrender.”
Greene’s prediction of a win notwithstanding, she surely knew that another possibility—perhaps even a probability—was that she would have wound up like another once-influential Republican lawmaker who turned on Trump: Liz Cheney. As a new House member in early 2021, Greene helped to defenestrate Cheney after she voted to impeach Trump for his role in fomenting the January 6, 2021, riot that sought to overturn the president’s defeat. Cheney, too, had largely supported Trump for four years; after their split, she lost her position in GOP leadership and was trounced in a Wyoming primary by a Trump-backed challenger.
Greene has been a bigger Trump booster than Cheney ever was. She built her improbable 2020 campaign—her emergence from a nine-way primary took Republicans by surprise—on support for the president. On the day Greene was sworn in, she
wore
a face mask that read
Trump Won
, and one of her first acts was to object to the certification of Michigan’s electoral votes for President Joe Biden.
That a political neophyte who spouted conspiracy theories—about 9/11, school shootings, and California wildfires that she claimed might have been caused by
space lasers
controlled by Jewish bankers—could win election to Congress appalled leaders in both parties; Mitch McConnell, then the Senate minority leader, called Greene’s views
“a cancer”
on the Republican Party. But she was a representative in the truest sense, in that she symbolized the many Americans—surely more than the 800,000 who composed her Georgia constituency—who both loved Trump and believed things that weren’t true.
Greene understood that the keys to achieving power in Trump’s GOP are loyalty and an ability to command attention. She excelled at each for a time. Greene once compared Trump to Jesus and Nelson Mandela, gushed about “how good” he looked, and said she appreciated that he was “genuinely kindhearted and caring about everyone.” Her ties to Trump forced then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy to restore her committee assignments once Republicans retook the House majority in 2023. Earlier this year, McCarthy’s successor, Mike Johnson, appointed her to lead a House subcommittee overseeing
DOGE
, the cost-cutting agency that Trump tapped Elon Musk to lead. Although the assignment gave Greene an ostensible platform and some legitimacy, it epitomized the perfunctory role that Congress has come to play in Trump’s second term; in practice, DOGE operated wholly without regard for the prerogatives of the legislative branch. (Greene alluded to this dynamic in her resignation announcement, bemoaning that for most of Trump’s first year back in office, “the legislature has been mostly sidelined.”)
Through it all, Greene was rarely far from the news. She seemed to reach her breaking point with Trump during the
shutdown
, when she denounced the GOP’s refusal to extend expiring health-insurance
subsidies
under the Affordable Care Act. Greene infuriated Trump even more by aligning with a GOP nemesis, Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky, who was pushing to force the administration to release the entire Epstein FBI file. Greene quickly discovered what most everyone else in Washington had long since learned: Loyalty does not go both ways with Trump.
Whether the president can still end a Republican politician’s career will be tested next year; he is trying to oust Massie in a primary. But Greene knew that without Trump’s friendship and blessing, her power within the GOP was gone. Even if she had stuck around and prevailed next year, she would have faced a future of diminished clout in a diminished Congress—not as first among equals, but merely as a single member out of 435, and not a particularly distinguished one. And where would be the fun in that?
