Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has long styled herself as Capitol Hill’s reigning chaos agent, thriving on provocation and unflinching loyalty to President Donald Trump. She’s now trying to sell a very different version of herself.
Greene’s interview with CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday marked an unusual turn for a lawmaker who has long fueled the country’s political flamethrower. Among other things, Greene said she wants to pull back from the “toxic” rhetoric she once treated as part of the job. The promise landed with extra weight because she’s openly sparring with Trump these days, and he’s begun taking personal shots at her as their long-running alliance unravels in public view.
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Greene, for her part, has started putting daylight between herself and the broader GOP. She’s criticized party leaders over the government shutdown, which ended last week, and cast herself—not for the first time—as a truth-teller in a party unwilling to confront its own dysfunction.
But the CNN interview revealed something deeper: Greene is afraid of the fallout from Trump’s words.
“The most hurtful thing [Trump] said, which is absolutely untrue, is he called me a traitor, and that is so extremely wrong,” she told Bash. “Those are the types of words used that can radicalize people against me and put my life in danger.”
When Bash asked why Greene stayed silent when Trump used similar language about others, Greene didn’t dodge. She called it “fair criticism” and offered something exceedingly rare from her: an apology.
“I would like to say, humbly, I’m sorry for taking part in the toxic politics; it’s very bad for our country,” she said. “It’s been something I’ve thought about a lot, especially since Charlie Kirk was assassinated.”
Greene said she has spent recent weeks reflecting on the threats and vitriol she has helped normalize.
“I’m only responsible for myself and my own words and actions … and I’ve been working on this a lot lately, to put down the knives in politics,” she said. “I really want to just see people be kind to one another.”
If that sounds like a new chapter, it would be—because the old one was unmistakable. Greene’s rise was powered by incendiary rhetoric and conspiracy-laden tirades that alarmed Democrats and Republicans alike. She lost her committee assignments early in her first term after CNN revealed she had shown support for Facebook posts advocating violence against Democrats.
Her history inside the House GOP hardly helps her case that she’s newly committed to reasonable politics. Greene has feuded with colleagues for years and was eventually expelled from the House Freedom Caucus in 2023 after a series of internal blowups. She brushed off the expulsion at the time—calling the group a “drama club”—but the disputes kept coming.
During a committee hearing the following year, she took a swipe at Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s appearance and ended up in a back-and-forth with New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez that quickly became one of the most-watched clips on Capitol Hill.
These days, she insists she is done with it all. America, she told CNN, needs “a new path forward” and leaders willing “to come together and end all the toxic, dangerous rhetoric and divide.”
“I’m leading the way with my own example, and I hope that President Trump can do the same,” she said.
Then again, she still sparks controversy. In the same interview with Bash she spoke in favor of Tucker Carlson having white supremacist Nick Fuentes on his podcast, as she explained, because she believes in free speech.
“And I think it’s important for people like Tucker Carlson and yourself to interview everyone. I don’t believe in trying to cancel someone by refusing to interview them and question them.”
Why the sudden reinvention? Greene won’t say directly, but fear seems to be doing some of the talking. She suggested Sunday that Trump’s recent barrage of attacks may have helped trigger a pipe-bomb threat at her construction company’s office and a series of hoax pizza deliveries.
“President Trump’s unwarranted and vicious attacks against me were a dog whistle to dangerous radicals that could lead to serious attacks on me and my family,” she wrote on X.
She repeated the concern several times in her post, saying she has endured swatting attempts and threats over the years—harassment she has long attributed to “the left.” This time, though, she argued Trump is fueling a fresh wave.
“Now that President Trump has called me a traitor, which is absolutely untrue and horrific … this puts blood in the water and creates a feeding frenzy,” Greene said. “It could ultimately lead to a harmful or even deadly outcome.”
Trump has shown little interest in de-escalation. Over the weekend, he signaled support for a primary challenger to Greene and blasted her on Truth Social as “Wacky Marjorie Traitor Brown,” insisting she is responsible for her own troubles.
“All I see ‘Wacky’ Marjorie do is COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN!” the president posted.
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Greene noted that the threats against her came days before a scheduled House vote to release Epstein-related documents, though she did not tie the events directly together. She defended her own record, saying she has “one of the most conservative” voting histories in Congress and has paid all her party dues.
“I love America and the American people, and I swore an oath to uphold the Constitution and always do so. I am not a traitor,” she wrote. “The toxic and dangerous rhetoric in politics must end, and we need healing in this country for all Americans.”
Whether Greene is actually breaking from MAGA or simply navigating a particularly messy public rupture remains an open question. What’s clearer is that the man who once empowered her is now targeting her—and Greene is discovering that stepping away from Trumpism can be far more dangerous than embracing it.
