Marjorie Taylor Greene has owned the derogatory nickname Donald Trump has branded her with, while eviscerating the president for an Epstein files “cover-up.”
The former Georgia congresswoman put her MAGA cred on the line when she began to clash with the president over issues including the handling of the Epstein files, and his propensity to get involved in foreign conflicts despite campaigning on an “America First” agenda.
The battle ended with Greene, once a Trump loyalist, quitting Congress, and Trump labeling her a “traitor” for daring to oppose him. Speaking on board Air Force One on Monday about the void left by Greene in Congress, Trump couldn’t resist a jab.
“We have a lot of people that want to take Marjorie Traitor Greene’s place. Many, many candidates,” he said, eliciting a typically firebrand response from Greene.
She replied to Trump’s sly dig on X, owning the label and reminding the president of a protracted saga that has haunted his second term.
“Him calling me that has become a badge of honor because I’m not in his cult, I refused to bow to his demands to cover up the Epstein files to protect his friends, and I stopped fighting the hardest for a team that intentionally refuses to win,” Greene wrote.
Trump has spent recent weeks trying to move the national conversation away from the Epstein files after, he says, he was totally exonerated by the most recent Department of Justice document dump.
However, interest in the case has persisted, especially after it was revealed that the FBI interviewed a Jeffrey Epstein victim who alleged that Trump sexually abused her when she was a teenager. No evidence was provided in the email chains or FBI presentation to support the allegation.
Reached for comment about the allegation, the White House referred the Daily Beast to a Justice Department statement that pointed out the allegation may be flawed as the recent dump “may include fake or falsely submitted images, documents or videos, as everything that was sent to the FBI by the public was included in the production that is responsive to the Act.”
The “Act” probably refers to the Epstein Files Transparency Act, the law, signed by Trump, that created a legal obligation to release the files.
Greene, meanwhile, has continued to trumpet the issue since leaving Congress. Issuing a warning to her former party ahead of the midterms in November, Greene wrote on X Sunday: “All of you MAGA influencers and the rest mocking the seriousness of women who were trafficked and raped as teenagers and young women look like cult fools.
“Good luck trying to get women to vote for Republicans in the midterms you insensitive clowns.”
She continued: “The Republican Party already has a woman voting problem. Keep mocking those of us who take rape and pedophilia seriously and demand accountability for corruption.”
It comes after Hillary Clinton also accused the administration of a “cover-up” over its handling of the files.
Trump’s 2016 election rival said that she and her husband, Bill Clinton, are being made to testify about the late pedophile to “divert attention” away from the president’s associations with him.
“I have nothing to hide. I’ve been exonerated. I have nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein. They went in hoping that they’d find it, and found just the opposite. I’ve been totally exonerated,” Trump responded aboard Air Force One on Monday.
White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told the Daily Beast: “President Trump is the unequivocal leader of the Republican Party. Marjorie Taylor Greene is a former congresswoman, traitor, and a quitter.”
