STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
What does it really mean when the president breaks up with one of his loudest supporters?
MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Marjorie Taylor Greene went to Congress from Georgia in 2021, just in time to promote President Trump's bid to overturn his election defeat. Her comments and conspiracy theories caused even her own party to shun her at times, until she rose as a flamboyant Trump backer. That made it all the more striking when she resigned on Friday, saying the president abandoned his own agenda. In a few minutes, a Republican strategist analyzes the debate over who gets to define the GOP.
INSKEEP: And NPR's Stephen Fowler is listening to that conversation. Stephen, good morning.
STEPHEN FOWLER, BYLINE: Good morning.
INSKEEP: How exactly does Greene critique Republicans?
FOWLER: Well, there was this nearly 11-minute video she released Friday night that aired a wide array of complaints, including mentioning threats to her adult children and attacks led by President Trump calling her a, quote, "traitor." But I think it's really important to listen to this point she made early on.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE: Americans are used by the political industrial complex of both political parties election cycle after election cycle in order to elect whichever side can convince Americans to hate the other side more. And the results are always the same. No matter which way the political pendulum swings, Republican or Democrat, nothing ever gets better for the common American man or woman.
FOWLER: Greene says that American politics are not great right now. And even though Republicans have complete control of Washington, her argument is that party leadership isn't actually keen on leading.
INSKEEP: Well, I guess this has been building up for a while. She criticized the president over his foreign policy, like when the United States bombed Iran. She questioned some domestic policies. And above all, she wanted the release of the Epstein files a lot more quickly than Trump was willing to agree to. So did she change?
FOWLER: Well, in Greene's view, she's not the one that changed. It's Donald Trump and others in the Republican Party who have not maintained consistency when it comes to being Make America Great Again, America First conservatives. It's also important to note that Trump has never been a traditional conservative, and his return to office was built on convincing a lot of different groups and demographics with different ideologies and priorities to unite under that America First banner but defer to his interpretation of what being a conservative meant. There have been a number of instances where some of the Republican base voters this year have said, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's not actually what we wanted, like the Epstein files, where Trump went from, I will release them, to saying Republicans who want that to happen are stupid to collaring Marjorie Taylor Greene a traitor for supporting the measure to signing the bill.
INSKEEP: Indeed. So what's the president saying now about Greene?
FOWLER: Well, he told ABC News it was good for the country she was leaving, posted on his Truth Social website that she was a traitor, again, who would have lost a primary. Then he told NBC News that he'd actually love to see her return to politics eventually, all in the span of less than a day or so.
INSKEEP: What? OK.
FOWLER: It does underscore what people have been saying about the president, both in public and behind the scenes. There are some on the right who are echoing his attacks and say about Marjorie Taylor Greene, good riddance. There are other Republicans and even Democrats in the House who say she's making some good points about things. And for what it's worth, Marjorie Taylor Greene says she would have won her primary and thinks Republicans are set to lose the midterms. Some of that feeling is backed up by voters in the district and in Georgia, expressing support for her and disappointment in what President Trump is doing.
And unlike plenty of clashes with more moderate Republicans who have all but disappeared from Trump's GOP, her role as this conservative stalwart inside the MAGA movement is really forcing the party to reckon more publicly and more quickly with the question of what the post-Trump GOP is going to look like.
INSKEEP: NPR's Stephen Fowler, who's reporting from Atlanta. Stephen, thanks so much.
FOWLER: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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