It sure looks like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene isn’t bluffing.
The MAGA firebrand from Georgia released a furious five-page letter Tuesday detailing why she filed a motion in March to oust Rep. Mike Johnson from his position as House speaker. At the time, she had described the filing as a “warning.” Her letter marks a new escalation. Capitol Hill observers see her missive as a serious threat to put Johnson’s speakership to a vote. At this point, it appears that if Johnson goes ahead in the coming weeks with a bill providing aid to Ukraine, Greene might just pull the trigger.
House Republicans are struggling to function as a party, with hard-liners threatening to tear the whole thing down.
That vote could cause chaos. If Johnson is toppled from his post, Republicans could be fighting over picking their third speaker in six months — and during an election year.
Greene’s standoff with Johnson underscores her own political evolution as she returns to playing the role of rabble-rousing activist after trying to play the inside track. And it illustrates how House Republicans are struggling to function as a party, with hard-liners threatening to tear the whole thing down if a leader makes even the most minimal attempts to cooperate with the Democrats.
It might be counterintuitive to think of Greene as a strategic player. Her first months as a representative in 2021 were mostly defined by the discovery of her racist conspiracy theories about Jewish space lasers and support for violent threats against Democrats online, which resulted in her being stripped of her committee assignments. When Republicans became the majority last year, however, she not only won back her committee assignments, but also became a player in Congress in part by aligning herself with the establishment of the party — specifically, developing close ties with then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. While she did not moderate her views much ideologically, she evolved as an institutional…
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