Marjorie Taylor Greene says Holocaust museum visit was ‘my decision’

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Tuesday it was her decision to visit the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, adding that “this was just something that I had thought about over time.”

“That was my decision,” Greene told CNN, saying also that the Holocaust is a “good thing to remember.”

After visiting the museum on Monday, Greene offered an apology for her previous comments comparing Capitol Hill mask-wearing rules to the Holocaust. The dramatic shift in tone was enough to prompt one Democrat to change course on an expected censure resolution in the House.

“There are words that I have said, remarks that I’ve made that I know are offensive, and for that I’d like to apologize,” the Georgia Republican said Monday, adding that she had taken a lesson from her father, who died in April, about owning up to mistakes.

“So I should own it,” she said on Monday. “I made a mistake.”

Following criticism from her Republican colleagues last month, Greene had initially issued a characteristically defiant and extended Twitter thread in which she repeated her attacks on Democrats and the media.

But the comments followed her back to Georgia’s 14th Congressional District, where some voters expressed dismay to CNN about her comparison. And members of her own party for weeks had called on Greene to educate herself about the Holocaust.

Jeff Miller, a board member of the Republican Jewish Coalition and member of US Holocaust Memorial Museum Council, tweeted last month, “I think you need to pay a visit to the US Holocaust Museum. I’d be happy to arrange.”

“Then maybe going forward you wouldn’t make anymore disgusting, ignorant and offensive tweets. If I’m wrong and you’re not ignorant about Holocaust..then you are disgusting,” he said.

Before Greene’s Monday museum visit, Rep. Brad Schneider, a Democrat from Illinois, announced plans to introduce a censure resolution over the congresswoman’s comments.

But Schneider said in a statement Tuesday that “in light of her apology,” he was “electing not to go forward at this time with introducing a resolution of censure.”

Schneider said that after hearing Greene’s comparison, he “never expected a retraction or an apology.”

“After all, Rep. Greene has a long history of unapologetically inflammatory and dangerous rhetoric. I was therefore pleasantly surprised to learn that she made the time to visit the Holocaust Memorial Museum (where I have the honor of serving as a trustee), and I appreciate that after her visit she understood the harm of her comparison and offered an apology,” he said.

Greene told CNN on Tuesday that she sought to make clear in her apology that “there is no comparison to the Holocaust” and called it “appalling” that some people will “minimize it and downplay it or don’t even know about it.”

The House had voted in February to remove Greene from her committee assignments after reports of her comments surfaced showing her encouragement of political violence, suggesting that the Parkland, Florida, school shooting was a “false flag” operation and a conspiratorial claim that a space laser controlled by Jewish financiers had started a California wildfire in 2018.

She has tried to make a name for herself being an outsider and a rabble-rouser and routinely uses parliamentary procedures to slow down House floor business, much to the dismay of her colleagues.

But the tactics have helped her win support on the far right. In April, her campaign announced she had raised $3.2 million in the first three months in office — an astonishing amount for a freshman member.

This story has been updated with additional information Tuesday.