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Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene says she will not vote in favor of legislation to fund the government unless it includes cuts to ongoing criminal investigations into former President Donald Trump.
“The unprecedented demand will likely garner momentum among the furthest-right members of the House Republican caucus. It also complicates what’s already shaping up to be a contentious fight, with the federal government’s functioning and the potential for a fiscal crisis hanging in the balance. Once a fringe member of the caucus, Greene has emerged as a key ally of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy,” Business Insider reported.
“I’ve made up my mind. I will NOT vote for a budget that funds the two tiered justice system in America. The Democrat controlled DOJ and FBI top brass are political and have weaponized their power against the right to persecute everyone with conservative values and aligned with Trump, but refuses to prosecute the left for their crimes. The Republican controlled budget must defund the two-tiered justice system and reign in the politically weaponized DOJ and FBI, or I will not vote for it,” she said.
Nick Dyer, a spokesman for Greene, issued a statement saying that the lawmaker was alluding to the Holman rule, a law that would allow Congress to target specific federal employees’ salaries and zero-out specific government programs.
Greene’s comments are in response to reports that “Trump is facing potential felony indictment over recording payments made to his attorney, which were then paid out to porn star Stormy Daniels in alleged hush money, as legal fees,” The Post Millennial reported on Saturday.
In January, House Republicans said they were going after the Holman rule and Democrats were not happy about it.
Greene spoke at the time about the “Holman rule” and urged Republicans to impeach Attorney General Merrick Garland as well as block the use of taxpayer money for a special counsel to probe former President Donald Trump.
Greene called on the GOP to “refuse to appropriate any funding to Merrick Garland’s Special Counsel and defund any part of the DOJ acting on behalf of the Democrat party as a taxpayer-funded campaign arm for the Democrat’s 2024 presidential nominee.”
In a tweet detailing the plan, Greene said that then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy would deny funding to the Department of Justice special counsel investigating Trump.
Greene said McCarthy would invoke the Holman rule, a procedural measure by which the House may adjust appropriations legislation to reduce the salary of or fire specific government employees. They may also use it to cut specific programs.
“Holman Rule. Look it up! [McCarthy] is going to put it in place,” Greene wrote. “That means no money for Garland’s politically weaponized Special Counsel. Don’t promise too many jobs! Whoops defunded.”
As the potential arrest and indictment of Donald Trump inches closer, an email leaked from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office shows what is on his mind.
Here is the full email from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to his employees, saying he will not tolerate intimidation after Trump called for protest. Story here: https://t.co/e6fuuYAKpV pic.twitter.com/8X3thHpwmy
— erica orden (@eorden) March 19, 2023
“The indictment and the charges are not going to go away,” Florida attorney Tamara Holder said to Insider. “This is an early stage of a criminal proceeding, and it’s very important that you present yourself to the court early on as somebody who’s going to fight the case and not fight the extradition.”
“The governor doesn’t have the power to stop an extradition,” she said. “The governor’s only involvement is to look at the papers and make sure that the papers are proper to issue the warrant.”
Former Palm Beach prosecutor Dave Aronberg said something similar in an interview with CNN in 2021.
“The governor’s power to stop an extradition is really nonexistent,” he said. “He can try to delay it, he can send it to a committee and do research about it, but his role is really ministerial, and ultimately the state of New York can go to court and get an order to extradite the former president.”
“If there’s a fully voted indictment, they’re not gonna start investigating the underlying facts of the indictment to determine whether it was sufficient or not,” New York attorney Michael Bachner said. “Once there’s an indictment voted, it would be shocking that a judge would not order extradition. Trump knows that.”
Several law enforcement agencies are reportedly preparing for a potential indictment of former President Donald Trump as early as next week, as the Manhattan district attorney’s office “asked for a meeting” with those agencies.
According to Fox News, a court source reported that a meeting was requested on Thursday but has yet to be scheduled.
According to the source familiar with the planning, the purpose of the meeting is to “discuss logistics for some time next week, which would mean that they are anticipating an indictment next week.”
