She says she'd "gotten sucked into some things..."
On January 22, a Texan Republican - Representative Michael McCaul - appeared on ABC news, and addressed the recent admission by Georgia's Marjorie Taylor-Greene just a week earlier, that she had previously fallen for conspiracy theories that she'd encountered on the internet.
McCaul - the newly elected chair of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs - suggested that while MTG has "matured" during her time in the House of Representatives, that it was incumbent upon other members of Congress to help educate her in order that she doesn't fall-foul of such theories in future.
Commenting on the matter, McCaul had this to say:
"She realizes she doesn't know everything and wants to learn and become more of a team player. I think it's incumbent upon more senior members of Congress...to try and bring her in and try to educate her that these theories that she has are not accurate."
Taylor-Greene had made her admission during an interview on Fox News on January 15, when she stated:
"Like a lot of people today, I had easily gotten sucked into some things I had seen on the internet."
Should other politicians have to educate MTG?
Whether senior politicians consider that it's their duty to help educate another elected official so that they don't fall for theories they've encountered online, remains to be seen. Some might argue that part of being a competent politician is to exercise good judgment and to be able to filter out nonsense from reality.
The lack of personal judgment that Taylor-Greene has previously exhibited, is troubling considering that she's recently been reinstated to a number of House Committees following the appointment of Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House, earlier this month.
There was speculation previously that MTG was backing McCarthy, specifically because he had promised she'd be reinstated to oversight committees by him.
She was stripped of all committee assignments after all Democrats and 11 Republicans voted in favor of this action after she openly advocated for violence against certain members of the senate. This month, she has been placed on the House Oversight Committee and the Homeland Security Committee, responsible for matters including the border crisis.
Given the power that she now possesses, in matters of great significance it's surprising that her fellow-Republicans should have to consider 'educating her' to help her avoid falling for internet conspiracies in future?
Appropriate use of power
There are few signs as of now that Taylor-Greene is indeed maturing as Michael McCaul suggested during his interview with ABC. In the weeks since winning reelection, MTG seems mainly to have focused on identifying governmental bodies and individuals that she feels should be defunded - presumably as she disagrees with their worth.
Immediately after McCarthy's ascension to Speaker of the House, Taylor-Greene was vocal about supporting the defunding of the IRS to put a hold on the recruitment of a further 87,000 agents to investigate tax evasion. Since then, she's applied the same approach to other federal divisions, including the ATF (after they introduced a law to prevent gun owners from using pistol braces on their weapons). She has also called for the defunding of the special counsel appointed to investigate Donald Trump.
Whether House Republicans will consider it their responsibility to 'educate' MTG remains to be seen.
Do you think that a sitting politician should need to be educated in how to avoid falling for internet conspiracy theories? Do you believe that House Republicans will take up Marjorie Taylor-Greene's cause? Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below.
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