Has Marjorie Taylor Greene Become the Voice of Republican Reason?

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has been consistent in her support for Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) in the race to become the next Republican speaker of the House.

Greene, a close ally of former President Donald Trump and member of the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus, has strongly criticized her colleagues for their opposition to McCarthy.

On Wednesday, she said she was "furious" with other members of the Freedom Caucus and said that three of them "were demanding positions for themselves" while she had made no demands despite currently having no committee assignments.

"You would think I would be the one in there asking for something, but I haven't done that. But I find out that it's my Freedom Caucus and my supposed friends that went and did that, and they asked nothing for me. Nothing. That's what I found out in there," Greene said.

On Thursday, Greene continued her support for McCarthy, tweeting after the inconclusive ninth ballot: "Good things are coming. Hold a little longer." She later rejected the idea of choosing former President Trump as speaker after he was nominated by Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL).

Political scientists who spoke to Newsweek suggested that Greene's position pointed to a more general dysfunction in the new Congress.

A Fight to the Death

Greene has said she isn't supporting McCarthy out of self-interest and slammed colleagues for reportedly seeking committee assignments but she has been consistent in backing McCarthy even before voting began this week.

"It's difficult to say what is motivating her to support McCarthy when most of the other Freedom Caucus extremists appear eager to fight to the death to prevent his election," Paul Quirk, a political scientist at the University of British Columbia, in Canada, told Newsweek.

"But we can be pretty sure she is not trying to rescue the Republican Party from chaos, let cooler heads prevail, and enable the House to function effectively," he said. "Her mission has always been about promoting herself through conspiracy theories, outlandish provocations, and ultra-Trumpism."

Quirk said that Greene "may be trying to outdo all the other Trump loyalists by dutifully accepting even his obviously tepid endorsement of McCarthy."

"The other McCarthy opponents—all loyal Trumpists, as well—apparently don't believe that Trump really cares what happens to McCarthy," he went on. "Greene is also miffed that the opposition faction negotiating with McCarthy has not prioritized any of her personal interests, such as the restoration of her committee assignments."

The Trumpist Line

Trump has backed McCarthy for speaker and Greene said on Thursday that she didn't want to see the former president as speaker but wanted "to see him actually be President."

Other Trump allies in the House have persistently opposed McCarthy, but Greene could be motivated by loyalty to the former president, according to Mark Shanahan, an associate professor at the University of Surrey, in southern U.K, and co-editor of The Trump Presidency: From Campaign Trail to World Stage.

"It shows what a loony-tunes world the House of Representative has become if Marjorie Taylor Greene is ever seen as the voice of reason," Shanahan told Newsweek.

"But in her support of Kevin McCarthy for speaker of the House, she may have shown that there are members among the Republican cohort intent on being even madder and badder than the second-term representative from Georgia," he said.

Shanahan argued that there's "little" that is "altruistic in Taylor Greene's stance."

"Former President Donald Trump has stated to the GOP that they should back McCarthy, and Taylor Greene is never slow to echo the Trumpist line," he said.

"And she also sees McCarthy's accession to the top House job as her path back to some plum committee appointments—roles she lost under the Democrats in the 117th Congress," Shanahan went on.

Greene was stripped of her committee assignments by a vote of the Democrat-led House in 2021 over past comments she had made about the QAnon conspiracy theory and mass shootings. She had apologized for those comments at the time.

No Full-Scale Pivot

Greene may appear to be more reasonable than a minority of her colleagues who have now prevented McCarthy winning the speakership in 11 ballots but she's unlikely to change her behavior more generally, according to Thomas Gift, founding director of University College London's Centre on U.S. Politics.

"Marjorie Taylor Greene and 'voice of reason' are typically contradictions in terms," Gift told Newsweek. "So to see her take the moderate position on anything—much less backing Kevin McCarthy for speaker—is understandably going to turn heads."

"Still, it's unlikely that this represents a full-scale pivot for Greene to the side of sanity," Gift went on. "She's fundamentally the same person who's trafficked in QAnon theories, claimed that California wildfires were triggered by space lasers, and said that [former Speaker] Nancy Pelosi was in charge of the 'gazpacho' police."

A 'Profoundly Dysfunctional' House

The House will reconvene at noon on Friday and is likely to move to a 12th ballot for speaker and as many more ballots as may be necessary until someone reaches the required majority.

While Greene will almost certainly continue to back McCarthy, division in the House may point to dysfunction ahead.

"Taylor Greene is in this for herself, but her actions in separating from other right-wingers such a Gaetz and [Lauren] Boebert [R-CO] may well presage the kind of venomous infighting that's likely to characterize the Republicans' supremacy in the House over the next two years, where those who hold the whip hand are likely to be far further to the right than any of their Republican predecessors," Shanahan told Newsweek.

Boebert has called for McCarthy to step aside and nominated Rep. Kevin Hern (R-OK) on Thursday, though Hern voted for McCarthy.

Paul Quirk said that whatever happens with the speaker vote "the clear lesson of this speaker election is that the Republican House will be profoundly dysfunctional over the next two years."

"The narrow Republican majority has a pivotal faction that will not abide any significant cooperation with the Democratic president and Senate; that refuses to cooperate with other Republicans; and whose members, we now see, have difficulty cooperating even with each other," he said.