Representative Cori Bush (D-MO) announced on January 29 that she intends to move her office away from the office of Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), the QAnon congresswoman whose history of apparent support for online comments about violence against Democrats has invigorated concerns about her presence in Congress. In tweets posted Friday, Bush detailed examples of times she felt threatened by the Georgia Republican, who is one of the new members of Congress to openly support QAnon conspiracy theories.
“A maskless Marjorie Taylor Greene & her staff berated me in a hallway. She targeted me & others on social media,” Bush wrote just before noon eastern time on Friday. “I’m moving my office away from hers for my team’s safety.”
“I’ve called for the expulsion of members who incited the insurrection from Day 1,” Bush said. She also called for a vote on HR 25, the House resolution she announced the day of the January 6 Capitol attack as a means to expel members of Congress who incited the pro-Trump forces.
In a longer statement shared Friday afternoon, Bush shared more about an exchange she had with Taylor Greene on January 13 and announced her office was already being relocated.
“On January 13, I was walking with my staff to vote,” she began. “I was in the tunnel between the Cannon Office Building and the Capitol when Marjorie Taylor Greene came up behind me, ranting loudly into her phone while not wearing a mask. This took place one day after multiple of my House colleagues announced they had tested positive for COVID-19 after being in a room with Taylor Greene during the white supremacist attack on the Capitol.”
Taylor Greene was one of several House Republicans who declined to wear a mask in a lockdown location during the attack; a week later, several people who’d been in that secure location tested positive. She defended her decision, citing a January 4 negative test and contradicted science that indicates the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 can be spread by asymptomatic people who might appear perfectly healthy.
“Out of concern for the health of my staff, other members of Congress, and their congressional staff, I repeatedly called out to her to put on a mask,” Bush continued in her account of what happened on January 13. “Taylor Greene and her staff responded by berating me, with one staffer yelling, ‘Stop inciting violence with Black Lives Matter.’”
Bush referenced other hostilities from Taylor Greene, like a tweet from Martin Luther King Jr., Day that Bush said constituted the Georgia representative making the Missouri congresswoman a target for her followers.
“In the context of Taylor Greene’s repeated endorsements of executing Democratic politicians before taking office, Taylor Greene’s renewed, repeated antagonization of the movement for Black lives in the last month directed towards me personally is cause for serious concern,” Bush wrote. “All this led to my decision to move my office away from Taylor Greene’s for the safety of my team. My office is currently being relocated.”
Taylor Greene responded on Twitter, sharing what she said was a video of the situation from January 13. In the footage, Taylor Greene is accusing Democrats of supporting “Antifa/BLM riots” when a voice off camera yells, “Follow the rules and put on a mask!” Taylor Greene pulls up her mask, which reads “CENSORED.” January 13, the day the exchange took place, was the day she wore the mask to the House debate over the second impeachment of former president Donald Trump.
Taylor Greene wrote in a tweet sharing the video that it suggested Bush had “berated” her and that Bush was “the leader of the St. Louis Black Lives Matter terrorist mob.” In another tweet, she accused Bush of supporting and encouraging “BLM domestic terror.”
Taylor Greene’s role in the Republican Party has become extremely contentious, as she’s a living testament to the GOP’s embrace of QAnon conspiracy theories. Yahoo News reported in 2019 that QAnon has been identified as a domestic terror threat by the FBI.