House

Pelosi says top Democrats won’t back measure to expel Greene

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Friday that House Democratic leaders aren’t backing a resolution to expel Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) from Congress over past endorsements of political violence. The resolution, which Rep. Jimmy Gomez (D-Calif.) introduced earlier Friday, has 72 co-sponsors. But it would be a heavy lift for Gomez’s effort to succeed, given that expulsion requires a two-thirds supermajority in the House. Pelosi indicated Gomez was free to introduce an expulsion resolution, but that Democrats shouldn’t expect leadership to sign onto it. “Members are very unhappy about what happened here, and they can express themselves the way they do. What Mr. Gomez did is his own view. And that is not [the] leadership position,” Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol. Eleven Republicans voted with Democrats last month to remove Greene from her assignments on the House Education and Labor Committee and the Budget panel. While some Republicans have criticized Greene over her past embrace of conspiracy theories and endorsements of violence against Democrats, it’s unlikely that enough Republicans would join with Democrats to reach the two-thirds threshold needed for expulsion. “I believe some of my Republican colleagues, and one in particular, wish harm upon this legislative body. And I’m not saying this for shock value. It’s the conclusion I drew after a member of Congress advocated violence against our peers, the Speaker and our government,” Gomez said on the House floor on Friday morning. Only five members have been expelled in the House’s history. Greene has acknowledged that she previously believed in the baseless QAnon conspiracy theory, which she has since disavowed. The GOP lawmaker also distanced herself from past statements suggesting that school shootings and the 9/11 terrorist attacks were staged. But when the House voted in February to boot her from committees, Greene did not directly address her past indications of support for violence against Democrats, including Pelosi, former President Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Greene previously “liked” a Facebook comment in January 2019 that said “a bullet to the head would be quicker” to remove Pelosi. And when a Facebook commenter asked her in April 2018 “now do we get to hang them,” referring to Clinton and Obama, Greene responded: “Stage is being set. Players are being put in place. We must be patient. This must be done perfectly or liberal judges would let them off.” Greene further posted an image on Facebook last September of herself holding a gun next to pictures of progressive Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) with the caption “Squad’s Worst Nightmare.” Facebook later removed the post for violating its policies.