Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene is set to join the House Homeland Security committee in a decision that is drawing disbelief and disgust from her critics who find themselves unable to fathom that a onetime 9/11 truther and spreader of countless conspiracies will now sit on a committee making decisions about America’s defence.
The news broke on Tuesday as committee assignments for the 118th Congress were released following the marathon vote to confirm Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House. Ms Greene notably did not join anti-McCarthy rebels on the right in an attempt to block his bid in what many speculated was a bid for his favour.
She will now have access to potentially sensitive classified information, a significant change of fortune for the Georgia congresswoman who was stripped of her committee memberships during the last Congress after a Facebook account in her name was found to have “liked” comments endorsing violence against Democrats including Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker.
Ms Greene has clearly taken steps since joining Congress to back away from her past rhetoric.
The list of transgressions that led to her punishment by the House in 2021 was long, and included videos of her as a conservative activist making outrageous false claims about her political enemies, even going as far to blame the Clinton family for the death of John F Kennedy Jr.
She would go on in February of 2021 to try and back away from as many as she could in one go in a surreal speech to the House floor during which she declared correctly that “9/11 absolutely happened” and “school shootings are absolutely real”.
Those efforts were insufficient to stave off punishment from a Democratic Congress, but under Kevin McCarthy’s razor-thin majority in the new Congress Ms Greene will find herself newly empowered as long as she remains loyal to the speaker, whose reign is expected to be fragile.
Her past comments were resurfaced by Democrats on Tuesday as they expressed disgust over her appointment.
Democratic congressman Ritchie Torres tweeted: “As the former Vice Chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, I’m HORRIFIED that it was just announced that Marjorie Taylor Greene will serve on the committee. A QAnon conspiracy theorist + Jan 6 insurrectionist doesn’t belong on a committee that exists to fight extremism.”
His colleague Ted Lieu wrote: “Here is exhibit 9,387 as to why House Republicans are extreme: they put Marjorie Taylor Greene on the Homeland Security Committee. She questions whether a “so called plane” on 9/11 really struck the Pentagon, and spews many other crazy conspiracy theories.”
Ms Greene is far from the only controversial House member to receive committee assignments today; George Santos found himself seated on the House Committee on Small Business despite growing calls from members in both parties for him to step down or be thrown out of Congress. He remains under state and federal investigation after telling a whirlwind of lies about his background before being elected to the House last year.
