This is what a nightmare scenario looks like.
With the party reeling in the wake of its 2020 disintegration – when it lost many centrist voters – state Republicans now worry that Greene will emerge as the face of the Republican Party, tarnishing the entire plate with a conspiracy theory and extremism stamp on the run until the semester of 2022.
“If you have common sense, you know that she is an anchor of the party. She is oppressing us, ”said Gabriel Sterling, a Republican electoral administrator who has become an important voice in criticizing the unfounded electoral conspiracy theories espoused by Trump and his supporters like Greene.
“Some people are saying that maybe [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi is going to expel her ”from Congress, Sterling said, referring to the mayor. “Democrats would never expel her. They want it to be the definition of what a Republican is. They will give her every opportunity to speak, be heard and look crazy – like the one that came out on Wednesday, the Jewish space laser to start fires. I mean, I don’t know how far you go in the rabbit hole. “
Judging by old social media posts and videos that surfaced last week, this hole is quite deep. Greene promoted the conspiracy theory that space lasers caused forest fires in California, that school shootings were scams and suggested that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should be executed for treason.
Greene is expected to play a central role as a campaign issue in 2022, when Sterling’s chief, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, runs for re-election along with two other Republicans, Governor Brian Kemp and Lieutenant Governor Geoff Duncan.
All three are likely to face primary challenges, but Raffensperger’s role in overseeing state elections and his office’s decision to secretly register Trump by asking him to somehow “find” votes to override the presidential election results have made him one of the main targets of Trump supporters.
In this scenario, Greene – who will also run for re-election in the conservative northwest corner of the state, where Republicans need to campaign – must play an elevated role.
Establishment Republicans fear that if the Republican Party appoints party conservatives from the Trump and Greene wing of the party, they risk the same fate as Sens Republicans. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, who lost on January 5.
Loeffler’s opponent, Senator Raphael Warnock, is running for re-election in 2022 and may share the ticket with Stacey Abrams, the 2018 Democratic nominee for government who is preparing to run again.
Both Democrats are black, which adds to the racial issue – an issue that has haunted Greene, who has a history of making racist and insensitive comments to racism.
Loeffler’s top advisers say that Trump probably cost him the election and that Greene was not a factor. But it could be in 2022 after the saturation coverage of Greene’s previous comments.
“Greene was just a symptom of what is happening in the Republican Party in the state and, frankly, in the nation, in our election,” said a Loeffler adviser. “But in 2022, it will be a symbol, assuming it is no longer.”
During Greene’s run for 2020, Kemp advised Greene in particular to “tone it down,” according to an informed source on the conversation. But now he is in such a weakened position from a longstanding rivalry with Trump that he is leaving Greene alone, at least for now.
“We are on fire and there is not much we can do now,” said a Kemp adviser.
Chip Lake, a 2020 Senate candidate adviser and former deputy Doug Collins, agreed with other Georgia Republicans who expected President Joe Biden and the Democrats who control Congress to overreact and turn the state to the right during the elections. 2022.
Until then, he said, Kemp and other major Republicans are playing for time.
“It’s the legislative session here in Georgia, so Kemp can say that he’s focusing on that and that Marjorie Taylor Greene is a federal problem,” said Lake. “But over time, it will become a problem for Kemp and has the potential to be a problem for all of us.”
House minority leader Kevin McCarthy is under pressure to punish Greene, but members of the Georgia Republican Party fear he will not sanction her because Greene represents an energetic wing of the party and he will feel he cannot risk punishing one of Trump’s favorite post-holders.
Some Georgia Republicans blame McCarthy and his allies on the House Freedom Caucus for initially supporting Greene’s candidacy for congress and then doing little to stop it during the 2020 primaries, after his incendiary social media posts initially came to the fore. light.
At least one member of the Republican Party Congressional delegation, Congresswoman Jody Hice, withdrew her endorsement during the campaign, saying she found Greene’s statements “terrible and deeply disturbing”
After Hice snatched his support from Greene, a group of Republicans tried to garner support for an external political committee to tackle it during the primaries, but were unable to raise money because “McCarthy did not help at all,” according to a strategist involved in the discussions.
The group even launched a TV ad proposal on YouTube with Hice’s decision – the ad called her “fake” because she moved to the district to run for the chair. Another operative said that a different group of Republicans had a plan for yet another committee, but “McCarthy dismissed the donors. We couldn’t raise money. “
Asked about the accusations, a McCarthy spokesman did not comment on them, but said his “comments are deeply disturbing and leader McCarthy plans to have a conversation with the congresswoman about them”.
Georgia Republicans expect Greene to face a major challenge, and some hope that she can somehow be dragged into a more difficult seat during redistricting. But they recognize that it is popular in their district.
Greene’s main opponent in 2020, John Cowan, is considering running against her again. He blamed McCarthy, Trump’s chief of staff at the White House, Mark Meadows, and Ohio deputy Jim Jordan for supporting her. He said Democrats are already making Greene, known by his initials “MTG”, the face of the Republican Party – similar to the way Republicans sought to label Democrats as New York’s Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez party.
“MTG is the GOP’s AOC. But as much as I hate to say it, AOC is not as crazy as that, ”said Cowan. “I am a neurosurgeon. I diagnose madness every day. It took her five minutes talking to her to realize that there were bats in the attic. And then we saw that she had skeletons in the closet. “
A spokesman for Greene did not return emails requesting comments on this story, nor did he declare Republican Party President David Shafer.
One of Greene’s close allies is Georgia attorney Lin Wood, who was at the center of the Republican Party’s state conflict and represented her during the primaries, threatening legal action against a Cowan supporter who criticized her on social media. Aides to Cowan’s campaign, which featured the controversy in an ad, said they found it ironic that Greene – who wore a “censorship” mask to protest large tech companies that flag posts and suspend accounts – blocked the man shown in the ad and other critics on his Facebook page.
Greene had a head start on her primary contender in 2020 because she was running for another seat in the state, but moved to the 14th District of Congress when Rep. Tom Graves retired unexpectedly. No one else had a campaign team or the superior support that Greene already had, thanks to McCarthy and his allies, said Luke Martin, president of the Republican Party in Floyd County, one of the 12 counties in the district.
Martin said that Greene worked hard at holding several events and continues to offer city halls in the district. And, he said, she is not talking about QAnon or other wild conspiracy theories, nor did she do it on the stump.
“The people I talked to here are saying, ‘I like Marjorie, but, wow, I wish she didn’t say those things,'” said Martin. “The Marjorie we know in the district is not that person who uses laser beams from space.”
In Gordon County, Republican Party chairwoman Kathleen Thorman said there was a feeling that Greene was portrayed inaccurately in the mainstream media. Greene’s constituents, said Thorman, appreciated some of his initial actions in Congress, such as his petition for Biden’s impeachment, because people wanted to know more about his son’s business when he was vice president.
“People are crazy because they feel that Congress and the media are trying to silence their voices. They voted for her and feel that her voice is being silenced, ”said Thorman. “In two years, when she runs again, we’ll see what happens.”
Tony Abernathy, president of the Murray County Republican Party, expressed a similar sentiment in a text message: “The real story is that we love Marjorie Taylor Greene and we are tired of the national media coming to Georgia trying to tell us how to think about her District”.
Brian Robinson, an adviser to former Republican governor Nathan Deal, was concerned that criticism of Greene would lead to exactly the kind of mobilization effect she is seeing in the district and fundraising, raising her profile and ensuring that Republicans across the state are “constantly being putting this firing squad around why we are losing elections.”
Greene, he said, has an “it” factor and a mastery of social media that guarantees media attention, the indignation of his critics and the adulation and campaign contributions of his base.
“Here’s the problem with Marjorie Taylor Greene: you can’t look away. She has a great camera presence. She has a big presence on TV. She’s a natural, a real talent, ”said Robinson. “The question is, is she an idiot with natural talent or just a cynical manipulator? I happen to believe that she is a real idiot who happens to be great on camera. But we will see. “