Marjorie Taylor Greene: The 60 Minutes Interview Transcript

It’s rare for a member of the House of Representatives to become well known nationally, especially someone in only their second term. But Marjorie Taylor Greene, MTG, is as famous as they get. She’s gained her national celebrity, some say notoriety with a sharp tongue and some pretty radical views like her proposal for a national divorce where red and blue states would go their separate ways. But she has managed in just two years in Congress to accumulate real power, landing on important committees and influencing the direction of Republican policies. Before Congress, she helped run the family construction company in Georgia, known to be smart and fearless, and has a history of believing in conspiracy theories. We interviewed her earlier this week before former President Trump was indicted.

The story will continue in a moment.

We looked up some words that have been said about you. Crazy, Q clown, loony tune, unhinged, moron. Pretty ugly stuff.

Looks like the average troll in my Twitter feed, so I don’t really care.

You’re used to it.

No, I don’t let name-calling bother me or offend me. I just don’t.

How much have you styled yourself after Donald Trump? People say that you are Trump in high heels.

I didn’t intentionally style myself after President Trump, but I can see how people draw those similarities. We both come from the same industry, construction. I also have pretty much a plain speaking style and so does he.

But also he’s often in attack mode. And you appear to be.

Yes, but I think our government deserves it. They don’t really deserve to be respected that much.

Including for her, the president. While many consider Marjorie Taylor Greene’s behavior outlandish, even thuggish, MAGA activists and Right Wing Media, eat it up.

Thank you.

God bless you guys and keep up the good work.

Thank you.

In just two years, Greene at age 48 has moved from the fringe of the party to the front row.

The house will be in order.

Without changing either her style or her views.

… On an issue, when I’m outspoken about it and I take my stand or my position, the first reaction is Marjorie’s crazy. Marjorie’s extreme. Marjorie’s a Right Wing extremist. And then what will happen is my colleagues will go back home to their district and their own constituents are coming up and saying, “Are you supporting Marjorie? Do you agree with Marjorie? Have you co-sponsored Marjorie’s Bill?” And then they find out, “Oh, maybe she’s not crazy,” and then they end up agreeing with me.

(03:10)
Hi, good morning.

This is fueling her clout in the Republican Party, as is her record as a top fundraiser and a close advisor to Kevin McCarthy. After MTG helped him win the speakership, he rewarded her with positions on two powerful committees, House Oversight, that’s investigating the Biden family business dealings and Homeland Security. Now, what she thinks about the issues matters like preventing the government from going into default by raising the debt ceiling. Janet Yellen, the Treasury Secretary, says that if we don’t raise the debt ceiling, that this country will be thrown into an economic and financial catastrophe. And so I’m asking you if you are willing to risk that.

You know what put us in an economic catastrophe is again, the people that have spent $31 trillion that force this situation to happen.

Well, wait a minute. Trump is as much responsible for-

I said everybody.

… That as anybody. All right.

Everybody. Republicans, Democrats. It was all before I got here.

Would you be willing to vote for compromise? In other words, raise some taxes?

I don’t think we have a revenue problem in Washington. We have a spending problem.

You know something? That’s glib. What does that mean? The two sides have to come together and hammer it out.

Cut spending.

Both sides.

Both sides need to cut spending.

Where you want to cut it?

Covid bailout money and a lot of green energy spending.

But are you willing to let us go into default?

No. I’ve always said I wouldn’t do that.

So would you compromise?

It depends.

On taxes. You won’t.

No, I’m not raising taxes.

Greene complains that the news media harp on things she did in the past like as in this video chasing after a survivor of the Parkland Florida School shooting.

Well, if school zones were protected with security guards with guns, there would be no mass shootings at schools.

And things she says that are over the top like, “The Democrats are a party of pedophiles.”

I would definitely say so. They support grooming children.

They are not pedophiles. Why would you say that?

Democrats, even Joe Biden the president himself, supports children being sexualized and having transgender surgeries. Sexualizing children is what pedophiles do to children.

Wow. But my question really is can’t you fight for what you believe in without all that name-calling and without the personal attacks?

Well, I would ask the same question to the other side because all they’ve done is call me names and insult me nonstop since I’ve been here, Leslie. They call me racist, they call me anti-Semitic, which is not true. I’m not calling anyone names. I’m calling out the truth basically.

Pedophile?

Pedophile, call it what it is.

She also still calls a 2020 election stolen as she made clear in February.

I’m going to tell you, there was blatant outright fraud in the 2020 election. Complete and total fraud, and you know it. I come home as often as I can when we’re not in session.

Born and raised in Georgia. She now lives in an upscale section of her home district in the northwest corner of the state. How many acres do you have?

I have 10 acres.

Her net worth is estimated at $11 million. But she says when she was a child, her parents struggled financially trying to start their construction company. She told us that her dad and Arch Conservative listened to Right Wing Talk Radio all day long.

And naturally, me being with my parents a lot, I listened as well.

Your dad knew you as a politician. What did he think of your style, your pit bullness?

He was very proud of me.

Your mother? Did she ever say, “Marjorie, you need to tone it down?”

Yes. She did. Actually. She’s a southern mom and she believes in manners. Well, your problem is you’re just another one of those liars on television and people hate it.

She says her combative style came later in her life after she graduated from the University of Georgia.

This is our family photos.

And had three children with her now ex-husband. She worked for the family construction business that she and her then husband bought from her dad and grew into a lucrative enterprise. What are you up to now?

This is 205.

Oh my god. Greene didn’t discover her brazen gutsiness, she says, till after 2011 when she got hooked on Cross Fit workouts. She got into the extreme exercising with a passion, ending up in competitions, gaining self-confidence. She opened her own gym with a business partner, but at age 43, she sold her stake and turned to politics in 2019.

What made me run for Congress when I saw the Republicans in Congress, the House and the Senate, completely failed to deliver the agenda that we had all voted for, the reasons why we voted for Donald Trump. It was either-

The Republicans.

Yes.

Not Joe Biden, not Nancy Pelosi, but the traditional Republicans who she says failed to reign in federal spending, repeal Obamacare or fund President Trump’s border wall. When Republicans controlled both chambers of Congress.

They failed us.

Like who?

Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, those types of… Mitt Romney. I’m not even sure why he calls himself a Republican.

Why don’t you blame Donald Trump?

Well, I blame all of them for a lot of things, but again-

But not him.

Well, the president doesn’t control everything.

(09:38)
Hey, how are you?

Most of her constituents in her conservative, largely white working class district agree with her on the issues and especially like the way she fights for her beliefs.

New York transplant to Georgia, and I just love you.

Well, welcome to Freedom. Nice to meet you.

Shortly after she arrived in Washington, the Democratic led house, ousted her from her committees because of her past endorsement of violence against some democratic leaders and her history of embracing Q Anon that she explained in a speech on the house floor.

I stumbled across something, and this was at the end of 2017 called Q Anon, I was allowed to believe things that weren’t true, and that is absolutely what I regret. Well, I apologize to my colleagues. I think apologies are important.

Did you ever apologize to Nancy Pelosi about the bullet to her head?

I didn’t say that so I don’t need to apologize for words that weren’t mine.

Well, didn’t you like it?

Other people also ran my social media. I don’t think I did that.

Are you saying that you don’t stand by what’s on your social media?

Well, of course, I stand for what’s on my social media, but at times, you’re not always in control. We have all kinds of people that work on our social media.

Did you apologize for your position on Parkland, Florida?

What was my position on Parkland, Florida?

That it was a false flag?

I don’t know if you actually have my pos… No, I never said Parkland was a false flag.

Did you?-

No, I’ve never said that. School shootings are horrible, I don’t think it’s anything to joke about.

We fact checked before I got to this interview.

Have you fact checked all my statements from kindergarten through 12th grade and in college, and as I’ve paid my taxes and never broken a law, and I got a few speeding tickets. Do we need to talk about those two? Because I think where you’re going down is the same attacks that people have attacked me with over and over and over.

Well, if this is what you’re known for, I think it’s good that you’re responding to the charges. I think it’s-

I think being [inaudible 00:11:46] for them is-

… A legitimate thing.

… Because people-

For us to do.

… Constantly focus on it, but never focus on anything good about me.

Let me button this up and we’ll move on. You want to bring the Republican Party closer to your views? You want to bring the country closer to your views. You’ve said that. Here are some of the things you’ve said that America should have a Christian government, that abortion should be banned nationally, that you want to defund the FBI. Yes? You want immigration to stop for four years. You’ve said those things, correct?

Oh yes. These are some of my views.

The Constitution, the very First Amendment prohibits having a religion in the government.

Yet the founding fathers quoted the Bible constantly and were driven by their faith.

Marjorie Taylor Greene.

As a fervent supporter of the now indicted Donald Trump. She was a featured speaker at Rally in Waco last weekend. While she’s adored here, the latest national poll has her approval rating at just 29%.

Marjorie Taylor Greene, you happen to be here. Would you like to run for the Senate? I’ll fight like hell for you.

The question for her and the country is can she expand her brash MTG brand beyond the Right Wing populist base?

Yes.

Marjorie Taylor Greene on her opposition to US support for Ukraine.

Ukraine is not the 51st state.

At sixtyminutesovertime.com sponsored by Pfizer.

That’ll be revealed to.