House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said embattled freshman Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene “recognized” the need to adhere to “a higher standard” as a member of Congress, and, in a private meeting, he condemned her past comments, including those endorsing QAnon conspiracy theories and her comments on school shootings and political violence.
“I made this clear to Marjorie when we met,” McCarthy said in a statement following a meeting with Greene, of Georgia. “I also made clear that as a member of Congress we have a responsibility to hold ourselves to a higher standard than how she presented herself as a private citizen. Her past comments now have much greater meaning. Marjorie recognized this in our conversation. I hold her to her word, as well as her actions going forward.”
Greene is poised to lose her committee assignments on Thursday.
Moments after McCarthy issued the statement, the House Rules Committee advanced a measure to remove Greene from the budget and education panels, citing her comments about school shootings and a past Facebook page “like” of someone advocating gun violence against Democrats.
McCarthy, in the statement, criticized Democrats for moving ahead with the vote to take Greene off the two committees.
McCarthy said he attempted to broker a compromise with Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, a Maryland Democrat.
“Instead of coming together to do that, the Democrats are choosing to raise the temperature by taking the unprecedented step to further their partisan power grab regarding the committee assignments of the other party,” McCarthy said.
McCarthy said Democrats “continue to do nothing” about incendiary comments from Democratic lawmakers, including House Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters of California, who in 2018 called on people to harass supporters of then-President Donald Trump in restaurants and elsewhere.
