By Susan Cornwell
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Congressional Democrats on Monday said they would seek to strip conspiracy theory-backing Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene of committee assignments over incendiary comments including denying school shootings took place and expressing support for violence.
Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz said she would introduce a resolution on Monday stripping the newly elected Georgia representative of her seats on the education and budget committees of the House of Representatives and call for a floor vote if Republican leaders do not act to do so.
“We can’t stop her from speaking,” Wasserman Schultz said in an online news conference with two other Democrats, Representative Ted Deutch and Representative Jahana Hayes. “What we can do though, is essentially render her nearly powerless. That’s what the intent of this resolution is.”
Wasserman Schultz’s approach would require a simple majority vote to pass the House, where Democrats hold 221 seats to Republicans’ 211. That makes the measure far easier to pass then a separate effort, circulated by Democratic Representative Jimmy Gomez, to expel Greene, which would require a two-thirds vote to pass.
Greene has supported false online claims that school shootings were staged, including the 2012 killings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut and the 2018 massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
CNN reported last week that Greene in online posts before running for office expressed support for executing Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“If you cannot acknowledge basic truths, that 26 children and adults were murdered in Sandy Hook Elementary School, and 17 more were mercilessly slain in Parkland High School, then you cannot be trusted to make education and budget policy,” Wasserman Schultz, who represents a Florida district, said.
Top House Democrats support the idea. They will give House Republican leaders an ultimatum this week to either strip Greene of her committee assignments or Democrats will bring the issue to the floor, according to a source familiar with top Democrats’ thinking.
A spokesperson for House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy said last week that he was disturbed by Greene’s comments and planned to have a conversation with her about them. There was no immediate comment from his office on Monday.
Greene’s office, asked to comment, repeated statements she made last week, that Democrats and the media are targeting her because she is a conservative Republican. “They are coming after me because like President Trump, I will always defend conservative values,” she said.
(Reporting by Susan Cornwell; Editing by Scott Malone and Cynthia Osterman)
