Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Saturday defended attending a white nationalist conference in Orlando, Fla., on Friday night, arguing that she was only there to “talk to the audience.”
In a recorded interview Saturday with CBS News correspondent Robert Costa, Greene said she did not personally know Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist leader who organized Friday night’s conference at the Orlando World Center Marriott.
“I don’t know what his views are, so I’m not aligned with anything that may be controversial,” Greene said. “I went to his event last night to address his very large following because that is a young, very young, following and a generation I am extremely concerned about.”
Fuentes, a podcaster and talk show host whom the Anti-Defamation League has deemed a white supremacist, founded the America First Political Action Conference (AFPAC) in 2020, which has attracted far-right leaders.
Greene — whose personal account was banned from Twitter and who was stripped of two committee assignments last year for promoting violence against Democrats — spoke out against cancel culture at AFPAC on Friday night.
“I’ve been attacked more than any other freshman member of Congress in United States history,” she said, according to a video posted by the Republican Accountability Project, a group against far-right and extreme conservatives.
Fuentes, who was subpoenaed last month by the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, also spoke at the conference and was photographed shaking Greene’s hand at the event.
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) condemned Greene’s presence at the conference.
“Does Marjorie Taylor Greene know no shame?” DNC spokesman Ammar Moussa said in a statement
Moussa called for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) to remove Greene from the caucus.
“In any other world, Greene speaking at a white supremacist conference where attendees have defended Vladimir Putin and praised Adolf Hitler would warrant expulsion from the caucus, to say nothing of her advocacy for violence and consistent anti-Semitism is disgusting,” Moussa said.
In her interview with Costa, Greene said she wanted to “talk to them about America First policies.”
“The reason why I went is to talk to the audience, just like I’ve talked to many different audiences,” she said. “It wasn’t an alignment. It was about getting everyone together to save our country.”