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For years she was one of Donald Trump’s most loyal foot soldiers. Marjorie Taylor Greene trafficked in racist statements, indicated support for executing Democrats and even floated conspiracy theories about Jewish space lasers. Beneath a red “Make America great again” cap she became an instantly recognisable face of the Maga movement.
Yet in recent months the Georgia congresswoman has surprised friend and foe alike. On issues ranging from healthcare to Gaza to the Jeffrey Epstein files, she has broken ranks with Republicans and won unlikely fans among Democrats. The streak of independence has stirred speculation about her motives – and future ambitions.
Notably, Greene has stopped short of directly criticising Trump himself and has so far avoided incurring the president’s wrath. But her willingness to dissent from the party line is all the more remarkable under a president who notoriously prizes loyalty and punishes critics.
“I was wrong about Marjorie Taylor Greene,” was the headline of an Atlanta Journal-Constitution article last week by political columnist Patricia Murphy, who wrote: “Even if you don’t agree with Greene on everything – or even most things – you have to admire her willingness in this moment to say what is true, even when other Republicans refuse to. Maybe it’s career suicide, or maybe it’s leadership.”
Greene long revelled in her role as a far-right provocateur. She led prison visits to rioters arrested after the January 6 insurrection, called for Joe Biden’s impeachment and, at last year’s State of the Union address, confronted Biden while wearing a Maga hat and heckled him during his speech.
But since Trump’s return to office, the 51-year-old has increasingly gone rogue on both domestic and foreign policy. She criticised White House plans to send “billions of dollars” worth of weapons to Ukraine and broke from the Republican party’s longstanding support for Israel by describing its war in Gaza as a “genocide”.
She was one of just four Republicans to sign on to a discharge petition to release files related to the sex offender Epstein, repeatedly dismissed by Trump as a “hoax”. Speaking at a press conference with Democratic congressman Ro Khanna, she insisted: “The truth needs to come out. And the government holds the truth.”
Greene has been among the most outspoken critics of House speaker Mike Johnson’s stance during the federal government shutdown, arguing that Republicans should be in Washington rather than indefinite recess and it is they who have the power to end the standoff.
She is also siding with Democrats in their drive to continue the pandemic-era temporary expansion of Affordable Care Act premium subsidies to help Americans pay for upcoming insurance rate hikes.
In a lengthy screed on social media, Greene wrote: “I’m going to go against everyone on this issue because when the tax credits expire this year my own adult children’s insurance premiums for 2026 are going to DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district.
“No I’m not towing the party line on this, or playing loyalty games. I’m a Republican and won’t vote for illegals to have any tax payer funded healthcare or benefits. I’m AMERICA ONLY!!! I’m carving my own lane.”
It is a battle over the meaning of Maga. Greene denies that she is turning against her own party. She told the Hill website this week: “I am 100% the same person today as I was when I ran for Congress.” Indeed, her voting record in Congress is still closely aligned with Trump. But she claims to be staying true to her populist roots by siding with her constituents against the elites.
Andra Gillespie, a political scientist at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, said: “Marjorie Taylor Greene is a very complex person and she’s a complex politician and it looks like she’s making interesting choices. Overall she is still very much a Maga-identified Trump-supporting Republican.
“That is what is giving her latitude to be able to deviate from the party line and to deviate from the Trump line when she thinks it is advantageous to do so. One of the things that’s interesting about how she’s doing it is that she invokes basically a delegate-style representation when she does this.”
The Guardian put Greene’s political instincts to the test in a series of interviews with voters and found concern about steep premium increases in health insurance if the subsidies lapse.
Pete Van Horn, a retiree who is a Republican, said: “We’ve worked all our lives and them prices keep going up. That’s not right. We should get a break somewhere.”
Pat Hayman, a retired schoolteacher from Calhoun, Georgia, said of Greene: “She comes on a little hard but I basically agree with it. You know the healthcare system needs overhauling. I’m on Medicare and Blue Cross-Blue Shield, and we’re fine with that. But young couples? To me, it’s a business more so than taking care of [them].”
Michael Ross, an electrician from Floyd county, Georgia, laughed: “I think Marjorie Taylor Greene is hilarious. I’ll probably vote for her again. I’ll be honest with you. I don’t know what she thinks but I like to see shit stirred up.”
He added: “I like her stirring the pot. Is she crazy? She might be crazy. I don’t know. She’s got more information than I got. Like I said: I like to see the pot stirred.”
To some observers, Greene’s position is not so surprising. They note that Republicans have never been as dedicated to small government as the mythology of Ronald Reagan implies. Greene, they argue, is in line with the modern Republican party’s economic populism, including Trump’s own thinking.
Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center thinktank in Washington, said: ‘There are certainly many smaller government conservatives but she’s far from being a lone wolf here.
“In the question of support for working-class and middle-class Americans through government action, she probably speaks for a very large segment of Republicans, and a large group of people who would be Maga as opposed to old guard Republicans.”
Others suggest that Greene might have more personal motives for speaking out. She reportedly began to explore the possibility of running for Georgia governor or senator next year, only to be knocked back by the White House on the basis of polling that showed her divisiveness would put statewide seats in jeopardy.
Jeff Timmer, executive director of the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group, believes that Greene’s newfound willingness to speak out “can be attributed more to a woman scorned than the evolution of human goodness in Marjorie Taylor Greene”.
He said: “They didn’t want her to run; she’s getting a pound of flesh. ‘You wanted to put your thumb on me and thought I’d just play the loyal soldier? Well, I’m going to defy you on some key things like the Epstein files or healthcare and Medicaid.”
Yet Greene has been careful to continue expressing support for Trump. She has avoided – so far at least – an insult-laden rebuke on social media that could spell the beginning of the end of her career, as for so many Republicans during the president’s first term.
Her stance could embolden other Republicans to carefully test the boundaries of dissent. Maine senator Susan Collins has criticised the administration’s handling of the shutdown and taken aim at budget director Russ Vought for permanently laying off thousands of federal workers.
Texas senator Ted Cruz recently compared comments from the Federal Communications Commission chair, Brendan Carr – who hinted at punitive measures against broadcasters – to “mafia tactics”.
Beyond Capitol Hill, Oklahoma’s governor, Kevin Stitt, told the New York Times that he opposed Trump’s move to send Texas national guard troops to Illinois as a violation of “states’ rights”. And Utah’s governor, Spencer Cox, used X to register his own protest, condemning the administration’s cancellation of North America’s biggest solar project.
Gillespie of Emory University commented: “What Marjorie Taylor Greene presents is a challenge to the narrative that Republicans are a monolith at this point. Yes, Trump has consolidated power. The ideology in Maga, in the Republican coalition, has certainly shifted in a rightward direction and we have watched politicians adjust to that.
“But the Republican party still has some heterogeneity even as it is conservative and so you are going to see people deviate from the party. The question is: when and under what conditions do Republicans completely deviate from the Trump agenda and oppose the Trump administration in a way that lasts for more than a week or two?”
