Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene stripped of House committee positions over 9/11, school shooting conspiracies

US Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of Georgia, leaves her office on Capitol Hill on Wednesday
AFP via Getty Images
April Roach @aprilroach285 February 2021

Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has been removed from both her House of Representatives committees after Democrats accused her of promoting violent and hateful conspiracy theories.

It came after the Georgia representative, a former QAnon supporter who was elected in November last year, tried to disassociate herself from "words of the past".

Her previous remarks included baseless claims that school shootings such as the 2012 attack at Sandy Hook elementary school and the 2018 Parkland shooting were staged.

In a 2018 interview she suggested that the 9/11 attacks did not take place, referring to the "so-called plane that crashed into the Pentagon".

Eleven Republicans on Wednesday joined Democrats in voting to pass a motion by 230-199 to remove Mrs Green from the education and budget panels.

The vote was passed hours after Mrs Greene took to the chamber to express regret for the conspiracy theories she had shared.

She said: "I want to tell you 9/11 absolutely happened. I do not believe that it's fake.

"These were words of the past. These things do not represent me.”

Rep. Liz Cheney heads to the House floor to vote at the U.S. Capitol
Getty Images

The 46-year-old attempted to shift the blame to the media, saying they were “just as guilty as QAnon for promoting lies”.

She also did not address her previous claims that Mr Trump was the real winner of the 2020 election.

Republican House Minority leader Kevin McCarthy said in a statement that he condemned Mrs Greene’s comments but he also said she should not be punished for her remarks.

He instead accused the Democrats of trying to “distract Congress”.

“Past comments from and endorsed by Marjorie Taylor Greene on school shootings, political violence, and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories do not represent the values or beliefs of the House Republican Conference,” said Mr McCarthy.

“I condemn those comments unequivocally. I condemned them in the past. I continue to condemn them today.”

He added: “In the end, this resolution continues to distract Congress, especially given the limited time that Speaker Pelosi and the Democrat leadership want the House to debate and work, on what it needs to focus on: getting Americans back to work, getting kids back to school, and providing vaccines to all Americans who need it.”

House Republicans also debated stripping Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming of her leadership post as a penalty for her vote to impeach Mr Trump.

In a 145-61 secret ballot vote Republicans voted against punishing Ms Cheney.

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