Far-right Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has told The Independent that a vote to impeach President Joe Biden is her price after she steadfastly supported House Speaker Kevin McCarthy throughout the current Congress.
Ms Greene’s words come after her rival in the House GOP conference, Lauren Boebert, said she would file a privileged motion to impeach Mr Biden. Ms Greene said she would vote for the motion despite their disagreements.
“I don’t play petty personal games,” she said. Ms Boebert and Ms Greene were on opposite ends of both the fight to make Mr McCarthy the speaker and to raise the debt limit, with Ms Boebert opposing both and Ms Greene supporting both.
“I made it clear in the conference to everyone in the conference, and I don't have a problem addressing the conference,” she said, saying Ms Boebert did not address it.
Ms Greene has separately introduced resolutions to not just impeach Mr Biden but also Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, FBI Director Christopher Wray, US Attorney for the District of Columbia Matthew Graves. CNN reported that Mr McCarthy has discouraged pushing impeachment at the moment.
But Ms Greene said that voters are on her side about Mr Biden being a criminal and chided her fellow Republicans for wanting to sidestep the allegation.
“Everyone knows that except our conference and I made it clear to everyone in our conference, that impeachment is what we should be doing here,” she said. Ms Greene said her second priority is passing her legislation called the Protect Children’s Innocence Act, which would criminalise providing gender-affirming care for minors and prohibit taxpayer-funded gender-affirming care.
Ms Greene said she has consistently been a good footsoldier, paying her dues with the National Republican Congressional Committee and $100,000 extra on top of that, as well as voting for various pieces of legislation that were a priority for Mr McCarthy and House leadership.
“Most of them haven't even done their dues,” she said. “I got the votes for McCarthy to become speaker. I voted on the debt ceiling bill even though I called it a s*** sandwich because I found things I liked in it.”
Ms Greene has become a close ally of the speaker whereas other conservatives have frequently criticised him, and she said her support for the debt limit bill gave the GOP enough votes to pass it in the House.
“I gave cover to a whole bunch of Republicans,” she said. “But I can't get my protect children's innocence bill passed? I can't get that to happen? Protecting kids? And then I can't have them even start the process on [House Judiciary Committee] for impeachment.”
Ms Greene said there might be consequences if her priorities did not come up.
“Like I'm sorry, I'm done,” she said. “This place needs to do something and I made it clear this morning and I'm not backing off of it.”
Conversely, progressive Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the number two Democrat on the House Oversight & Accountability, scoffed at the plans to impeach Mr Biden.
“They're doing this because they can't even agree amongst themselves that what to put on the floor,” she told The Independent. “So they're wasting not just our time with the rest of the country.”
The House Oversight Committee’s chairman, Republican congressman James Comer, is currently leading the probe into Mr Biden and his son Hunter Biden.
Jared Moskowitz, a Democratic freshman who also sits on the committee, said that Republicans should follow through on the plan since it would come at a price.
“But you know what, let them put their money where their mouth is, let them go ahead,” he said. “They think it's a good idea. Go ahead, start impeachment proceedings. You know why they're not gonna do it. Because they know the American people aren't gonna stand for it.”
But Ms Ocasio-Cortez said she did not welcome the development.
“I don't welcome it because I think we should actually be working for real issues that matter," she said.
