Marjorie Taylor Greene's Gift of the Gab Sees Far-Right Social Media Following Flourish
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has fully embraced social media platform Gab for political power and fundraising purposes, bringing mainstream followers onto its extremist platform and mobilizing the extremists already there, the American Jewish Congress (AJC) has claimed.
Gab is an alternative social media network that champions free speech, and has attracted neo-Nazis, white supremacists and QAnon conspiracy theorists. QAnon is a disproven and discredited American far-right conspiracy theory alleging that a secret group of Satan-worshipping pedophiles was running a global child sex-trafficking ring. The conspiracy theory alleges the secret cabal looked to remove former President Donald Trump from office.
In a report released on Tuesday, the association of American jews said followers of Greene post content involving white supremacist rhetoric, symbols, and grievance on Gab. AJC said that this demonstrates the lawmaker's willingness to embrace overtly anti-Semitic and extremist supporters.
Greene has previously been criticized for incendiary comments, such as that a plane did not hit the Pentagon on 9/11; that the Sandy Hook and Parkland school shootings were staged; that prominent Democrats should be executed; and that California forest fires last year were caused by a space laser operated by the prominent Jewish Rothschild family.
The AJC report released on Tuesday, called 90 Days of White Supremacist Radicalization, Extremisim's Evolution In a Post-January 6th America, featured a whole section on the Georgia representative.
Marjorie Taylor Greene is fully aware of her supporters' extremist views on Gab, who relish her voice, the organization said. AJC analyzed content openly posted to Gab by 100 randomly-selected Gab supporters of Greene and found that many of her followers on the social media site promoted conspiracy theories about the 6 January Capitol attack.
58 percent of those who had interacted with Greene's Gab profile shared her content or posted or shared other positive content about her with their followers while 54 percent posted or shared conspiracy theories about the 6 January attack on the Capitol.
54 percent posted or shared conspiracy theories and misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic. 42 percent posted or shared QAnon related content or content from self-identified QAnon accounts, 42 percent shared or posted content promoting or supporting white supremacy.
AJC added that a number of her supporters on the social media platform "are openly engaged in posting and/or sharing content promoting white supremacy, some are neo-Nazis openly posting Swastikas and other Nazi symbols in their posts and on their profiles."
"Given Gab's courting of white supremacists and neo-Nazis who have been deplatformed from mainstream social media sites, their presence on Gab is both unsurprising and disturbing," the report said.
"The active presence of an elected official on Gab, like Rep. Greene, is deeply troubling. Gab is a known hornet's nest of both antisemitic and extremist activity. By actively soliciting both political and financial support from members of this platform, Greene knowingly solicits direct help from the types of domestic extremists that led the insurrection on January 6th. This is not an appropriate venue for a Member of Congress and she should close her account there," Joel Rubin, Executive Director of the AJC told Newsweek.
The report cited multiple examples of white supremacist posts among Greene's followers, one referencing the "great replacement" white supremacist conspiracy and linking to an article on VDARE, a website linked to white supremacists. Such white supremist policies were also found in the 2019 New Zealand Christchurch attackers' terrorist manifesto, AJC said.
Gab's founder, Andrew Torba, wrote in a post on 4 February, 2021, "We need 200+ Marjorie Taylor Greene's in Congress. We need to absolutely overwhelm thee demons with solid patriots who actually represent We The People. 2022 is our revenge on the GOP. Anyone who didn't stand by President Trump gets voted off the ticket in the primaries. Gab is proving to be a force in the American Popularist movement and this train has NO BRAKES!". The post received over 9,600 likes and over 2,500 shares, the report said.
Newsweek has reached out to Rep. Greene for comment.
On 31 March, more than 5,000 Christians signed a petition condemning Greene, for recent remarks she made related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
