GOP, Dems in tit-for-tat over removal of Marjorie Taylor Greene, Ilhan Omar
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy met privately with fellow Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to discuss her litany of controversial political stances — as Democrats ramp up pressure to have her removed from her committee assignment and the GOP seeks to have Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) stripped of her committees in a tit-for-tat effort.
The Tuesday night meeting between McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Greene (R-Ga.) lasted about 90 minutes and took place in his Capitol office.
Afterward, the No. 2 GOP lawmaker summoned members of the House Republican Steering Committee for a late-night meeting to discuss the matter.
The Steering Committee assigns fellow party members to powerful committees, and is in itself an extremely influential panel to be on.
Greene has not commented on the meeting directly, but appeared to acknowledge it in a post on Twitter that included a screenshot of reporting on the meeting.
In a series of tweets, the fringe-right lawmaker slammed Democrats and argued that McCarthy would never be able to compromise enough for the opposing party.
“No matter what @GOPLeader does it would never be enough for the hate America Democrats,” she wrote.
During her meeting with McCarthy, according to Politico, the Republican leader offered Greene, who sits on the House Education and Labor Committee, a few options.
One option would be to denounce QAnon and apologize publicly for publicly backing conspiracy theories and supporting calls for violence against Democrats. Another, McCarthy reportedly offered, would be for Greene to remove herself from the committee.
The third option would be for Greene to do nothing, and risk being removed by a vote on the House floor from both the education panel and the House Budget Committee, which she also serves on.
Despite Democrats controlling the House, there is considerable GOP appetite to remove Greene from her committee assignments.
According to Politico, McCarthy told members of the Steering Committee during their late-night meeting that he would try to broker a deal with House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) to avoid a floor vote on Greene.
The top House Republican said he would offer to pull the freshman lawmaker from the Education and Labor Committee if Democrats backed off their plans to vote to remove her from both panels.
A decision was not reached on the issue of Greene’s assignments, but GOP lawmakers on the Steering Committee will meet again Wednesday to discuss it further.
Meanwhile, a group of Republican lawmakers plan to bring up another option during Wednesday’s conference — offering up a proposal to also oust Omar from her committee assignments in the interest of fairness in light of the Minnesota lawmaker’s past controversial remarks about Israel, which she eventually apologized for after they were broadly slammed as anti-Semitic.
The group, consisting of Reps. Brian Babin and Ronny Jackson of Texas, Jeff Duncan of South Carolina, Jody Hice of Georgia and Andy Biggs of Arizona, will argue, according to Fox News, that Omar should also be stripped of her committee posts “in light of conduct she has exhibited.”
A spokesperson for McCarthy did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment on his meetings with Greene or the Steering Committee.
Asked by CNN if GOP leadership had made any call about Greene, House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) said, “No, we’re going to be working through some things.”
Pressure on Republicans has only escalated in recent weeks to address Greene’s behavior, especially in the wake of the Capitol riot.
In a public rebuke Monday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) called Greene’s “loony lies” a “cancer” on the party.
“Loony lies and conspiracy theories are cancer for the Republican Party and our country,” McConnell said from the Senate floor.
“Somebody who’s suggested that perhaps no airplane hit the Pentagon on 9/11, that horrifying school shootings were pre-staged, and that the Clintons crashed JFK Jr.’s airplane is not living in reality. This has nothing to do with the challenges facing American families or the robust debates on substance that can strengthen our party.”
In those same remarks, McConnell also defended House GOP Conference Chair Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), who is facing a reckoning of her own over her vote to impeach former President Donald Trump late last month.
Cheney, the No. 3 leader of the House GOP caucus, infuriated scores of Republican lawmakers with the decision.
In the weeks since, efforts have grown to remove her from party leadership, and her name is expected to come up as an item of contention during Wednesday’s call.
With Post wires