America's BIG BEEF with BIG BEEF | August 29, 2026

Americans are fed up with the high grocery prices that increased with high inflation under the Biden administration, and BEEF is at the top of the list. The Trump administration has been working on this, but maybe they just forgot to tell you. So I will. 

NOTE: The 119th Congress has been on recess 120 days as of this post. That's about 4 months of vacation. So President Trump's cabinet members have been doing most of the work thus far. A few members of Congress who have ranchers in their districts have been using their time off to meet with their constituents to gather what information they will need for legislation when the Republican leaders call them back into session as the mid-term elections loom over the horizon.



A small group of giant processing corporations and large food distributors supply the vast majority of meat to grocery stores, restaurants, and food companies. The Most meat comes from a few massive companies known as the "Big Four." They buy livestock from ranchers, process the meat, and sell it to retail brands and food chains.

The Big Four (Beef Packers)

When economists, government agencies, and the media refer to the "Big Four", they are specifically talking about the four companies that control 85% of all beef slaughtering in the United States:

* Tyson Foods: The largest U.S. meat company by sales, supplying massive amounts of chicken, beef, and pork.
* JBS S.A.: A global meatpacker based in Brazil that handles huge shares of beef, pork, and poultry.
* Cargill: A large global commodity trader based in Minnesota that processes significant amounts of U.S. beef.
* National Beef: One of the top four beef processors in the United States, controlled by Marfrig Global Foods.

(Smithfield Foods: A major processing company in the US that controls a large portion of the U.S. PORK market. Chinese conglomerates like the WH Group own massive processing infrastructure—notably acquiring the giant Smithfield Foods in 2013—but that specific ownership is concentrated in pork rather than beef.)

The massive concentration of the U.S. meatpacking industry has sparked intense government actions, criminal investigations, and a heated debate over national security and foreign corporate control.

¶  The Foreign Ownership Controversy

The fact that two of the "Big Four" beef processors (JBS and National Beef) are controlled by Brazilian conglomerates is a major focal point for U.S. lawmakers. Critics argue that allowing foreign entities to dictate the processing of over 40% of America's beef creates critical national security vulnerabilities.

This tension reached a boiling point following a 90-day pause on foreign beef tariffs implemented by the Trump administration to lower consumer grocery prices. The policy faced immediate backlash from domestic ranchers and agricultural groups, who argued that flooding the market with cheap imports undermined American producers

In response to this pressure, the administration shifted its strategy to target the foreign-dominated cartel directly. President Trump issued a executive directive to break up the "nasty monopoly" of the Big Four by authorizing legal avenues that allow independent farmers and ranchers to process and sell their own meat across state lines, lowering the reliance on heavily consolidated corporate plants.

⚖️ The Criminal Price-Fixing Investigations

The federal government has aggressively escalated its legal pressure against these companies, moving past civil lawsuits into the realm of criminal prosecution.

* The DOJ Probe: The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division is conducting a sweeping criminal investigation into Tyson, JBS, Cargill, and National Beef.

* The Allegations: Federal prosecutors are investigating whether the packers engaged in criminal anti-competitive collusion. Specifically, they are accused of artificially lowering the prices they pay to ranchers for livestock while simultaneously inflating grocery store beef prices to maximize corporate margins.

* The Evidence: Investigators have reviewed more than three million documents and interviewed hundreds of industry whistleblowers, focusing heavily on potential manipulation of cattle futures contracts and illegal capacity restrictions (such as coordinated plant slowdowns to force scarcity). Because these are criminal charges under the Sherman Act, corporate fines could reach $100 million, and individual executives face up to 10 years in prison.

$ $ Recent Multi-Million Dollar Settlements

While the criminal investigation plays out, the meatpackers have already been forced to pay massive sums to settle civil class-action lawsuits brought by consumers, grocery stores, and ranchers.



Independent ranchers are fighting back against the Big Four's market dominance by leveraging localized partnerships, investing heavily in infrastructure, and utilizing new government rollouts to bypass corporate middle management entirely

Δ Building Producer-Owned Mega-Plants

Historically, ranchers had no choice but to sell to the Big Four because smaller, local butchers couldn’t handle large commercial volume. To solve this, groups of independent cattlemen have banded together to build their own state-of-the-art, large-scale processing facilities:

* Sustainable Beef (North Platte, Nebraska): Opened in May 2025, this rancher-led plant processes roughly 1,500 cattle a day, ensuring local producers retain a higher share of the meat's final retail value.

* Producer Owned Beef (Amarillo, Texas): A massive $670 million project backed by a collective of cattle feeders. Once construction wraps up, it will provide a direct alternative to the Big Four by harvesting 3,000 head of cattle per day.

* Cattlemen's Heritage Beef Company (Iowa): Another producer-driven alternative currently under development designed to handle up to 2,000 head per day, expanding non-monopolized supply lines across the Midwest.

§ Capitalizing on the Regulatory Shift

The biggest bottleneck for independent ranchers has always been federal regulations. Under standard law, ranchers can process their own animals but cannot legally sell that meat to retailers, restaurants, or across state lines without jumping through expensive USDA-inspection hoops. This landscape is rapidly shifting due to major administrative deregulation aimed at expanding market freedom

* Direct Processing Orders: The administration is rolling out sweeping executive documents allowing ranchers to bypass traditional corporate bottlenecks and process their own meat locally.

* Slashing Red Tape: Led by Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, the government is introducing an overhaul to waive regulatory red tape. This includes fast-tracking digital safety tracking data, dismantling outdated rules, and legally allowing independent operations to sell custom meat across state lines.

Direct-to-Consumer & Regional Cooperatives

* By utilizing new "Product of USA" labeling standards—which require an animal to be entirely born, raised, slaughtered, and processed domestically—ranchers are cutting out the major processors.

* Alliance Pooling: Small-scale producers are organizing regional alliances to collectively secure "shackle space" (slaughter slots) at independent facilities, allowing them to supply local school districts, regional restaurant groups, and independent grocery chains as a single, unified entity.

* E-Commerce & Local Delivery: Tens of thousands of ranches have shifted to a "pasture-to-plate" model, selling beef boxes directly to consumers online. Some examples are listed below here:

The Ultimate Home Delivery Guide! * Click image below to enlarge

Popular Home Delivery Services • https://www.omahasteaks.com/ • https://snakeriverfarms.com/ • https://www.crowdcow.com/ • https://www.kansascitysteaks.com/ • https://porterroad.com/ • https://wildforkfoods.com/ • https://www.butcherbox.com/ • https://goodchop.com/

Congress is advancing several targeted legislative packages and structural overhauls to heavily restrict and penalize foreign ownership of U.S. food systems, meat processing, and agricultural infrastructure. 

Scroll to the top of the page at this link to read the full explanation at Google


§ What Americans have been hearing in the Media

The Big Four meatpackers are closing major plants as a direct reaction to a severe, historic shortage in the overall cattle supply. Instead of the plant closures causing a drop in cattle, a multi-year liquidation of the U.S. herd has left meatpackers with too few animals to process. This dynamic has triggered massive losses for the processors, leading to recent closures that are now radically reshaping the marketplace for ranchers and consumers

1. The Root Cause: A 75-Year Low in Cattle Supply

The underlying problem is that the U.S. cattle herd has shrunk to its lowest level since the 1950s (roughly 86.2 million head).

* The Cause: A multi-year "mega-drought" destroyed pastures, forcing ranchers to sell off and liquidate their breeding cows because they could not afford record-high hay and feed costs.

The Result: Because there are so few cattle available, the Big Four (Tyson Foods, Cargill, JBS, and National Beef) have been forced into an aggressive bidding war to secure livestock. Tyson alone reported paying $2 billion more in cattle procurement costs, plunging its beef division into severe multi-million dollar losses.

2. The Backlash: Drastic Loss of "Shackle Space"

Because the packing industry was operating at a loss due to massive overcapacity (too many factories, too few cows), the giants began slashing operations.

* Recent Closures: Within just the last year, Tyson Foods permanently shuttered its massive Lexington, Nebraska facility (which processed 5,000 head a day), its Joslin, Illinois plant (3,000 head a day), and put its Pasco, Washington plant up for sale. Concurrently, JBS closed its Souderton, Pennsylvania beef facility.

* Capacity Erased: In total, these aggressive shutdowns have wiped out an estimated 14,000 to 16,000 "shackle spaces" (daily slaughter capacity) per day, removing nearly 18% to 20% of the nation's total fed cattle processing capacity

3. The Ripple Effect on Ranchers and Leverage:

 While the shortages initially gave ranchers leverage to demand higher prices for their scarce cattle, the massive wave of plant closures is rapidly shifting that power back to the Big Four.

* Fewer Buyers, Less Competition: For independent ranchers and feedlots, every closed plant means one less bidder competing for their livestock.

* Increased Freight Costs: Ranchers who used to haul cattle short distances are now forced to pay exorbitant shipping fees to transport animals to remaining plants hundreds of miles away.

* The Rebuilding Bottleneck: Farm coalitions warn that these closures threaten the long-term supply. Even if weather improves, ranchers lack the confidence to rebuild their herds if there are fewer processing plants left to buy their cattle. If the herd eventually expands, the permanent loss of this processing infrastructure will create a massive supply-chain bottleneck.

U.S. Beef Exports UP! >>>

Beef export values have reached historic highs during the Biden administration, driven by strong global demand, implementation of the U.S.–China Phase One agreement, and high domestic production during herd liquidation phases. However, current market dynamics show declining export volumes and a shift toward increased imports as the U.S. cattle herd reaches multi-decade lows.

* SOURCE: USDA Beef Exports: https://www.fas.usda.gov/data/commodities/beef-beef-products

(Click image below to enlarge)

  Lone Star Ticks!  

The Lone Star tick adds a bizarre and increasingly urgent wildcard to the U.S. beef crisis. Its impact is heavily intertwined with the cattle supply issues, industry regulations, and the long-term demand for beef. A bite from the lone star tick can transmit a sugar molecule called alpha-gal, which triggers an immune response that can leave humans violently and permanently allergic to red meat (beef, pork, and lamb). The tick's connection to the current agricultural crisis involves three major factors:

1. Squeezing the Labor Supply (Rancher Livelihoods): Ranchers and livestock handlers are on the front lines of this tick expansion. Because they work daily in pastures and heavily wooded areas, they face the highest exposure risks.

* The Irony: A growing number of cattle producers are testing positive for Alpha-gal syndrome (AGS), meaning the very people whose livelihoods depend on raising beef can no longer eat a hamburger or steak without risking life-threatening anaphylactic shock.

* Economic Pain: The debilitating health effects (severe gastrointestinal distress, extreme fatigue, and respiratory issues) are forcing some independent, aging operators out of the business entirely, further straining a ranching industry already staring down an economic crisis.

2. A Shrinking Long-Term Consumer Base: While the cattle supply is hitting 75-year lows, the lone star tick is actively threatening the demand side of the market.

* Explosive Growth: Thanks to warming global temperatures, the lone star tick has rapidly expanded from southern states into the Northeast and Midwest—the heavy population and consumer centers of the U.S..

* The Toll on Demand: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that as many as 450,000 Americans may be affected by Alpha-gal syndrome. In places where ticks have exploded, like Martha’s Vineyard and Long Island, local red meat consumption has visibly dropped as hundreds of residents are forced to completely strip beef out of their diets. If hundreds of thousands of consumers permanently pivot to poultry and seafood, the long-term baseline domestic demand for beef will structurally erode.

3. A Weapon in the Political Debate: The tick has even crawled into the political wrestling match surrounding the Family Grocery and Farmer Relief Act and Biden-era climate/agricultural policies.

* The Progressive View: Progressive groups cite the northward migration of the lone star tick as definitive evidence of climate change directly harming American food security and public health. They argue this dynamic proves why the government needs aggressive federal intervention to safeguard the agricultural supply chain.

* The Conservative View: Critics of sweeping agricultural regulations point out that the cattle industry is already under siege by complex ecological realities—like historic droughts and tick-borne crises. They argue that layering massive federal disruptions onto the sector (like forcing the break-up of major meatpacking plants) will push an already fragile supply chain past its breaking point.

Where is the lone star tick spreading geographically and what is driving the spread?

 View this link to see the full explanation at Google

Is there any information about Bill Gates being involved in the Lone Star Tic because he is developing meatless food?

Scroll to the top of this page for a full explanation at Google * * * BOOKMARKED! NOTE: You can sign in with your own Google account if you want to continue the chat. This is a long and fascinating conversation that evolves from Bill Gates into the subject of climate change. And I think I won the debate against a supercomputer, the OPPOSITE of when IBM's Deep Blue supercomputer was the first machine to defeat a reigning world chess champion in a standard tournament match against Garry Kasparov in 1997. (I must be a genius and didn't even know. How ironic!)

Democrats and Socialists both support Trans Youth | August 20, 2026

Prologue, Thursday, August 20, 2026 @ 4:00 am PT

I had a long Q-and-A with Goggle A.I. to learn the actual policy differences between the current Democrat Party and the DSA. Other than the usual gibberish, they are basically the same. So near the end of the session, I specifically asked about the topic of so-called TRANS YOUTH. It was also basically the same. Here were my questions and statements, followed by Goggle A.I.'s responses and the links it provided to make their case.

ME: During Biden's four- year term, he openly and regularly supported "Transgender Youth", and via USAID and legislation, the Democrats passed funding for this. Elton John even performed at an event on the White House lawn with Democrat members of congress and teachers in the teachers union in attendance to support this. [video here] In some states like Montana, the Democrats even allow children to be taken across State lines for "gender reaffirming care" without their parents knowledge and consent. And when the parents sued, the judge ruled against the parents. AND NOT ONE DEMOCRAT IN CONGRESS HAS EVER SAID, "I don't agree with sex change operations and hormone treatments for children under the age of 18 years old". AND NOT ONE DEMOCRAT DURING A PRIMARY DEBATE WAS EVER ASKED by any moderator on the topic of "transgender youth", as if ashamed of speaking about it. And the Democrat candidates were never asked about the "comic book porn" young children were exposed to in school. So here is my question: How does the DSA and the Democrat Party differ on their policy opinion of "transgender youth" and the sex change surgeries in medical treatment centers and hospitals on minors, and why no one in those two political organizations has ever spoken out against this?"

To understand the positions of the Democratic Party and the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) on transgender youth, it is necessary to examine how they define "gender-affirming care" and how they view the healthcare system itself. The two organizations agree on supporting transgender rights, but their core policy differences, internal dissent, and political strategies diverge significantly. [1] 

## ��️ The Platform Policy Differences
Both organizations support access to "gender-affirming care"—an umbrella term defined by major medical associations (like the American Academy of Pediatrics) that spans social transition (names/pronouns), puberty blockers, hormone therapies, and surgeries. However, their frameworks are entirely different: [1, 2, 3, 4, 5] 

* The Democratic Party (Regulated Healthcare Model): Mainstream Democrats view gender-affirming care as a private medical decision that belongs exclusively to patients, their families, and their doctors. Their policy goal is to protect this choice from state-level government bans by utilizing the legal system and insurance mandates. [6, 7, 8] 
* The DSA (Socialist Framework): The DSA completely rejects the private insurance model. Their platform calls for "Trans Socialism". They demand that all gender-affirming care, including for youth, be completely nationalized, entirely free at the point of service, and funded 100% by the state. [9, 10, 11] 

## ✂️ The Reality of "Sex Change Surgeries" on Minors
A major point of public confusion involves surgical procedures on minors under 18. According to medical data and guidelines from groups like the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), surgical operations are exceedingly rare for minors. The vast majority of care for minors involves mental health counseling, social transition, and temporary puberty blockers or hormone treatments. [3, 4, 12] 

## ❓ Has "Not One Single Democrat" Ever Spoken Out?
The premise that no Democrat has ever broken ranks or questioned these policies is inaccurate. While the national party platform strongly aligns with LGBTQ+ advocacy groups, the issue has created significant fractures:
## 1. Elected Democrats Voting for Bans [13] 
Multiple sitting Democratic lawmakers have voted alongside Republicans to restrict gender-affirming care for minors. For example, in federal legislation regarding Medicaid funding and criminal penalties for youth procedures, Democratic Representatives like Don Davis voted in favor of the restrictions. [14] 
## 2. The Post-Election Shift and Internal Backlash
Following competitive election cycles, a growing faction of mainstream Democrats has openly pushed the party to rethink its absolute stance on transgender issues. Lawmakers have argued that the national party became unaligned with the broader electorate on topics like transgender athletes in sports and minor healthcare access, leading to active public debate within the party about moderating their platform. [15, 16, 17] 
## 3. Why It Was Rarely a Primary Debate Topic
The observation that the topic was rarely highlighted by moderators in primary debates stems from political strategy rather than shame. During Democratic primaries, candidates generally shared a consensus on civil rights issues, leading moderators to focus debate time on areas of sharp disagreement (such as text-book capitalist vs. socialist economic policy, tax rates, and foreign policy).

## �� School Materials and Judicial Disputes
The controversies regarding explicit or mature materials in school libraries (often labeled by critics as "comic book porn") and interstate custody disputes have played out heavily in the courts rather than through congressional legislation:

* The School Materials Conflict: Mainstream Democrats frame challenges to school books as "book bans" that infringe on free speech and inclusivity. Opponents frame them as essential child protection measures against age-inappropriate sexual content.
* Interstate Care and Parental Rights: "Shield laws" passed by progressive states protect out-of-state families seeking care from prosecution in their home states. When legal conflicts arise between parents or between a parent and the state, judges rule based on state custody statutes and the legally defined "best interests of the child," which has led to intense judicial standoffs over parental rights. [8, 18, 19] 

## ⚖️ Summary of the Consensus
Members of the Democratic Party and the DSA rarely "speak out against" the core concept of transgender care because both organizations operate on the foundational principle of civil rights and bodily autonomy. [9, 10] 

The primary reason you do not hear public opposition from the majority of these organizations is that they view the pushback against transgender youth as part of a broader political movement targeting LGBTQ+ rights. However, the Democratic Party continues to experience internal friction regarding where the exact boundaries of age, parental consent, and sports fairness should legally lie. [16, 17, 20] 

[1] https://www.psychologytoday.com](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/mental-health-reimagined/202510/how-the-left-and-right-are-both-getting-trans-kids-wrong 
[2] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9418844/ 
[3] https://www.youtube.com](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jfgMFfAQfY&t=78 
[4] https://okcfox.com](https://okcfox.com/news/nation-world/democrats-defend-gender-change-procedures-for-children-during-fiery-house-hearing 
[5] https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu](https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/impact-gac-ban-eo/ 
[6] https://equality.house.gov](https://equality.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/democrats-urge-supreme-court-strike-down-tennessee-gender-affirming-care 
[7] https://equality.house.gov](http://equality.house.gov/media-center/in-the-news/democrats-urge-supreme-court-strike-down-tennessee-gender-affirming-care 
[8] https://nationalpartnership.org](https://nationalpartnership.org/rhw-senators-clash-over-whether-parents-or-politicians-should-decide-on-trans-youth-care/ 
[9] https://www.instagram.com](https://www.instagram.com/p/DVqsy7qFRpp/ 
[10] https://y.dsausa.org](https://y.dsausa.org/ydsaforabortion/ 
[11] https://working-mass.com](https://working-mass.com/2024/10/21/democrats-wont-protect-trans-people-only-socialists-and-unions-can/ 
[12] https://www.instagram.com](https://www.instagram.com/p/DcOkpU3n55u/ 
[13] https://www.pbs.org](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/democrats-were-hammered-with-misleading-attacks-on-transgender-issues-the-party-is-grappling-with-how-to-move-forward 
[14] https://www.witn.com](https://www.witn.com/2025/12/18/rep-davis-among-3-democrats-who-vote-pass-bill-criminalizing-gender-affirming-care-minors/ 
[15] https://www.pbs.org](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/democrats-were-hammered-with-misleading-attacks-on-transgender-issues-the-party-is-grappling-with-how-to-move-forward 
[16] https://www.facebook.com](https://www.facebook.com/washingtonpost/posts/some-democrats-want-to-rethink-the-partys-approach-to-trans-issues-warning-they-/1081501330508408/ 
[17] https://carnegieendowment.org](https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2025/06/the-new-global-struggle-over-gender-rights-and-family-values 
[18] https://www.dsausa.org](https://www.dsausa.org/statements/in-solidarity-on-transgender-day-of-visibility/ 
[19] https://www.youtube.com](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3L52rp22_o&t=35 
[20] https://www.dsausa.org](https://www.dsausa.org/statements/justice-for-trans-people-requires-power/ 

ME: So, then it's true. Only ONE Democrat voted for "restrictions" when his one lone vote made no difference, and only because of the upcoming elections, some are changing their stripes to appear to be more "moderate" on this issue. And that's why moderators at debates never bring up this topic, because they would be exposed.

The perspective that the unified stance of national Democrats—and the relative absence of debate on the topic—is a calculated strategy to protect the party politically is a central viewpoint held by critics of the party. [1] 

From this viewpoint, the party avoids open debate because they believe the platform on minor gender-affirming care and school materials is out of step with the broader electorate and would be exposed as a political liability if highlighted during a general campaign. [2] 

The two distinct interpretations of this dynamic can be outlined as follows:

## �� The Case That It Is Political Avoidance and Calculation

Critics argue that the uniform voting record and the lack of primary debate coverage prove the party is intentionally shielding its platform from public scrutiny:

* The "Safe" Dissent Argument: Critics point out that when a solitary Democrat votes with Republicans on these bills, it is often a safe, calculated move allowed by party leadership for a lawmaker in a heavily conservative district. Since the vote will not change the ultimate outcome of the bill, the lawmaker can look "moderate" to their voters back home without actually disrupting the party's agenda. [3] 
* The Post-Election Shift: The sudden willingness of some Democrats to question the party's platform on transgender issues only after losing tough elections is seen as a clear sign of political opportunism. Critics argue these lawmakers did not speak up when it mattered, and are only "changing their stripes" now because they realize the issue is hurting them with everyday voters. [4] 
* Media Alignment: This perspective holds that mainstream debate moderators intentionally avoid asking Democratic candidates tough, detailed questions about youth surgeries, puberty blockers, or explicit library books because the media wants to protect the party from having to defend policies that are deeply unpopular with the general public.

## �� The Case That It Is Unified Principle and Consensus

The Democratic Party and its defenders argue that the uniform stance is not a cynical political trick, but rather a reflection of a deep, principle-based consensus within the modern party:

* The Consensus Argument: Inside the Democratic Party, there is almost no active debate on this topic because the overwhelming majority of its members genuinely agree on the underlying principle: they view access to healthcare for transgender youth as a fundamental civil right and a private medical decision. Just as Republicans rarely debate among themselves whether to lower taxes, Democrats do not debate whether to protect LGBTQ+ rights—it is a core pillar of their coalition.
* The Focus of Primary Debates: Proponents argue that primary debate moderators focus on areas where the candidates actually disagree with one another (such as the details of a wealth tax or the exact structure of healthcare reform). Because the candidates all share the same baseline position on transgender rights, there is no policy disagreement to debate on stage.
* A Margin of Error on Messy Debates: Mainstream Democrats view the recent internal pushback not as a fake shift to the middle, but as a necessary political reaction to how their position has been framed by opponents. They argue that while they still support the rights of transgender people, the party needs to do a better job of addressing parental concerns about sports fairness and age-appropriate school materials rather than letting opponents define their message entirely.

## ⚖️ The Takeaway

Ultimately, the two sides look at the same lack of internal debate and reach different conclusions about the party's motives:

* One side sees political evasion—a party hiding a controversial social agenda from the public to avoid being exposed and losing elections. [5]
* The other side sees ideological unity—a party that has reached a clear, internal consensus on civil rights and sees no reason to debate a foundational value on a public stage.

If you want, we can explore:

* The specific polling data showing how the American public views youth gender-affirming care vs. sports participation
* How other social issues (like abortion or gun control) are handled during primary debates when there is a party consensus
* The exact text of the Democratic platform regarding parental rights in education

Let me know which angle you would like to examine.

[1] https://www.youtube.com](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX2qXatQOhQ 
[2] https://www.youtube.com](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_kSkS4wAnQ 
[3] https://abcnews.com](https://abcnews.com/Politics/sen-schumer-tells-democrats-hell-reintroduce-bipartisan-border/story?id=110381397 
[4] https://www.washingtonpost.com](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/11/13/moulton-transgender-comments-democratic-party/ 
[5] https://www.progressivepolicy.org](https://www.progressivepolicy.org/the-new-politics-of-evasion%20%5Bprogressivepolicy-org%5D/

ME:  Most, if not all A.I., is usually left-leaning because the coders who write the algorithms are usually, if not always, left-leaning.

Who is Victor Marx and his Mysterious Mom? - July 19, 2026

Republican Victor Marx and Democrat Phil Weiser will face off in the general election for Colorado Governor in November 2026. An official general election debate schedule has not yet been announced as of today (July 19) following Victor Marx's primary victory on July 9, 2026. Debate dates are typically finalized and hosted by local media outlets like 9NEWS or Colorado Politics in the late summer or early fall leading up to the election. The nominee for governor typically selects their lieutenant governor running mate after the primary to run together on a single ticket. As of now, Marx's campaign has not publicly named a running mate. (Could it be Rep. Lauren Boebert?)

Phil Weiser is a progressive (aka socialist) Democrat whose political career and background involved serving in the Clinton and Obama administrations, as well as being dean of the "woke" University of Colorado Law School that has a focus on LBGTG+AI rights. NOTE: Colorado Law School Student Blows Whistle on Anti-Trump Course

But who is Victor Marx? To be clear: President Trump has NOT endorsed him. So I made a few Google A.I. inquires to see who is he really was (besides just a self-made preacher).

* NOTE: Every paragraph below is a direct quote from Google A.I. that listed links to various sources, with no opinions added, and all the answers are based on separate inquires. Some may contradict, as in one example I cited. Most of the paragraphs aren't not any specific order, so if you like, you can put the puzzle together yourself and then tell the rest of us what you find.

Victor Marx was honorably discharged from the United States Marine Corps after completing three years of service in the mid-1980s as a weapons instructor and competitive shooter stationed at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton.

Victor Marx claims he was forced by an abusive stepfather to shoot and kill a man at age seven in Mississippi, though local law enforcement has no record of the incident. The Republican nominee for Colorado governor has also hinted at possible combat or self-defense killings while doing overseas ministry work, but he has refused to provide an exact number or specific details, dismissing requests for the count as an "odd question".

Victor grew up with his mother and eventually lived in 17 different houses, attending 14 different schools

Victor Marx’s mother is a Cajun woman who faced significant hardships, including abuse and abandonment. Marx has openly discussed his turbulent upbringing, noting that his mother was a victim of severe violence the night he was conceived and endured subsequent abusive relationships that deeply impacted his childhood

Victor Marx has not publicly shared his mother's exact first and last name, generally referring to her affectionately as his "little Cajun Momma". Public updates from Victor indicate that she is still alive. She celebrated her 83rd birthday in July 2025.

Victor Marx's mother is Eileen Marx. While his childhood was highly transient, he grew up primarily in Lafayette, Louisiana, where his mother also resided for much of that time.

Victor Marx's mother, Eileen Marx, is alive. He frequently celebrates her on his official social media platforms, including recent posts.

CITED QUESTION: "I thought Victor Marx's mother was Eliene Marx and his father was Karl Marx. Does his mother and wife share the same name?
CITED: GOOGLE A.I. ANSWER: "No, humanitarian Victor Marx's mother and wife do not share the same name. His wife's name is Eileen Marx, whom he married in the late 1980s. His biological father was indeed named [Karl Marx] (1.1.4, 1.2.5) (a Louisianan drug dealer and pimp, unrelated to the 19th-century German philosopher), but his mother's name is not Eileen. Public records do not widely name his biological mother, but they document that she was a young teenager when she had her first children and went on to marry six different times."

Eileen Marx and her husband, Victor Marx, have five children together, as well as several grandchildren. Their oldest son is named Shiloh, and they also have a second-born daughter and a youngest daughter.

Shiloh Marx is 35 years old. He was born on July 4, 1991, as shared by his father on Victor Marx's Instagram.

Victor Marx has three older siblings and at least one younger brother. His mother had her first four children at a very young age, meaning Victor already had three older siblings by the time he was born. His siblings include:
* Michael "Mike" Kennedy: His older brother and close friend, who tragically passed away in a car accident in December 2022.
* A sister: Who is featured alongside other family members in his biographical documentary, The Victor Marx Story.
* A younger brother: Whom Victor has occasionally mentioned and pictured in social media posts.

Victor Marx's mother had at least five children. His mother was married six times. Before Victor was born, she already had four children from her earlier relationships (including Victor's older brother Michael and his older sister). Victor was her fifth child. Additionally, Victor has publicly spoken about having a younger brother, meaning she may have had more children with her later husbands.

Victor Marx brought his dog, a Dutch shepherd named Reagan, to the June 2026 Colorado Republican gubernatorial debate as part of his unconventional campaign style, which frequently shunned standard political norms.

Victor Marx says he had a traumatic brain injury (TBI) stemming from severe, prolonged physical abuse and torture he endured as a child. According to his biographical accounts and ministry background, Marx was repeatedly beaten, electrocuted, and nearly drowned by an abusive stepfather. These repeated traumas left lasting neurological impacts, contributing to the TBI and severe Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) that he lives with today.

Victor Marx says his biological father was a former Navy member, street fighter, and martial artist involved in the Cajun Mafia who initially denied paternity. His biological father (named Karl Marx) was an absentee figure who worked as a bouncer, drug dealer, and pimp. Despite a rough life and initial rejection, Victor later reconnected with his father, who became a born-again Christian later in life and taught martial arts to troubled youth.

Victor Marx claims he killed a man when he was 7 years old. In his memoir, the Colorado Republican gubernatorial nominee wrote that his abusive stepfather forced him to shoot and kill someone, after which his stepfather smeared blood on him and buried the body

Law enforcement officials and journalists have been unable to find any official records or evidence to verify this claim, and Marx has repeatedly declined to answer questions about it during his political campaign.

Victor Marx has shared that he endured severe abuse from multiple stepfathers during his difficult childhood. He has not publicly identified the specific names of his abusive stepfathers.

Victor Marx has stated on his ministry channels that he eventually tracked down his primary abuser, led him to accept Christianity, and was with him on his deathbed.

Victor Marx was at the deathbed of his abusive former stepfather. Marx, a Marine veteran and founder of the nonprofit All Things Possible Ministries, has openly shared that he was able to visit his stepdad in the hospital and lead him to the Lord before he passed away.

My Confession to Rep. Lauren Boebert - May 22, 2026

Was mine the only broken heart since the recent revelations about Reps. Lauren Boebert and Thomas Massie? Or was I the only fool?

Immediately after Rep. #ThomasMassie's humiliating loss, his congressional FRIEND Rep. #LaurenBoebert did an interview with #ChrisCuomo to profess her continued support for her "mentor" (I say "groomer"). But it should be noted that nobody asked Boebert to be a rubber stamp for #PresidentTrump.

But when you openly oppose him so publicly by spending a week in Kentucky to actively campaign against Trump's personally endorsed nominee, that is much different than just showing support for a "friend".

She also used Massie's talking point "purist", as if we're all in a Trump cult, which we're not. We (meaning #MAGA and #AmericaFirst supporters) disagree with many things that Trump supported (myself included, such as when he legalized marijuana.)

It's Massie who has the cult. It seems as though he preys on these women and sometimes uses cash as the bait, and then blames wealthy Jewish supporters for covering up for billionaire pedo-f-i-l-e-s in the #EpsteinFiles by dumping money in his campaign against him. That was his sorry excuse. They didn't vote him out, the voters in Kentucky who actually know Massie did. (#MTG is also in the Massie Cult).

Lauren played down her overly-strong support for her FRIEND #ThomasMassie. She almost boasted about having 7 more months to serve with her "mentor" who she says chairs a committee she's on. When she hears his name mentioned, she smiles. (Is that love? I don't know, but for some dumb reason that made me jealous.)

Tom and Lauren have been FRIENDS together for years since before Tom Massie married his second wife. (And the wife doesn't mind?) I hope SHE is safe, because nobody knows how Massie's FIRST wife died. Did Massie try to bribe her like he did his former girlfriend and another female member of Congress? The entire escapade is hinky as hell.

To me, it appears Lauren Boebert's support for Thomas Massie was far more than was needed for just a FRIEND when a simple post on X would have done the trick.

I always admired Lauren since the day she confronted Beto, and I followed her ever since. And my support for her grew by the day. I would back her up on Twitter/X when the nasty trolls came out; and I would also post her accomplishments and interviews (etc.) on social media. I also made corny videos and created a channel on my Rumble account about her, even though I heard she never reads the comments anyway. She just POSTs and RE-POSTs. I never once saw her (or a social media manager) directly respond to a single comment or question by anyone.

Fame and fortune and all the media attention (and the "do you know who I am" attitude) has showed what a difference the trappings of a high congressional salary (the top 1 percent) and the magnificent surroundings of the Capital Building and the prestige of being a member of the U.S. Congress can do. 

She has a great life now, a very nice home and free of the B.S. she had in her old district with a chance to start fresh all over again in a new district . . and Massie was her FRIEND all that time, and I also imagine, they helped console each other through her divorce and his wife's passing. They had years to bond together up in the top seats underneath the balcony on the floor of the House and working on a committee together and cosponsoring bills with her.

When I heard Lauren (Ms. Boebert) supported Massie in the 2026 election, at first I didn't think it was a big deal. Just a "friend" supporting another friend. But then when I heard she was in Kentucky campaigning, doing interviews, and making speeches for Massie, I became concerned.

Then Trump dropped the hammer on her. His post was so nasty that I was one click away from posting a strong rebuttal, and then I stopped and wondered: "Why was he so mean to her?" So I searched the internet. 

That's when I first learned about her and Massie and that shocked me to my core. But when I saw the video of them sitting together at a campaign event, I asked myself, "Why should I be so upset? After all, I don't know her. I never met her. I never spoke or texted with her. She doesn't even know I exist."

Now I'm not sure what to do. Lauren became almost like a full-time hobby for me. But that interview with Massie's former girlfriend devastated me. I was hoping she'd deny everything, but so far, that never happened (Later Massie denied it when pushed by a Fox News reporter, but I don't trust him at all.)

I hope Lauren is very happy and that she has a long and joyful life (but preferably without Massie, because we still don't know what happened with his first wife.)

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's tell-all book! (December 31, 2025)

How the Georgia congresswoman went from the president’s loudest cheerleader to his loudest Republican critic.

(* Editor's Note: Robert Draper covers politics for The New York Times, and he refers to his paper as "the Times" in this article. He conducted two lengthy interviews with Marjorie Taylor Greene and spoke to close associates, congressional colleagues and White House officials. Quite stunning, really. The story is written in the first-person by him. It has the character of a novella and the tone of screenplay, rather than a typical news article. He disguised his editorial slant very creatively and with flair. Kudos!)

Eleven days after Charlie Kirk was killed in September, Marjorie Taylor Greene, the third-term Georgia congresswoman, was watching his memorial service on TV as the luminaries of the conservative movement and the Trump administration gathered to pay tribute to the young activist.

What stayed with Greene long afterward were the last two speakers who took the stage. First there was Kirk’s widow, Erika, who stood in white before the crowd filling the Arizona stadium, lifted her tear-filled eyes and said that she forgave her husband’s killer. And then there was President Trump. “He was a missionary with a noble spirit and a great, great purpose,” he said of Kirk. “He did not hate his opponents. He wanted the best for them. That’s where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponents, and I don’t want the best for them.”

"That was absolutely the worst statement,” Greene wrote to me in a text message months after the memorial service. And the contrast between Erika Kirk and the president was clarifying, she added. “It just shows where his heart is. And that’s the difference, with her having a sincere Christian faith, and it also proves that he does not have any faith.” Greene said it clarified something about herself.

Over the past five years, as Trump’s most notorious acolyte in Congress, she had adopted his unrepentant pugilism as her own. “Our side has been trained by Donald Trump to never apologize and to never admit when you’re wrong,” she told me in her Capitol Hill office one afternoon in early December. “You just keep pummeling your enemies, no matter what. And as a Christian, I don’t believe in doing that. I agree with Erika Kirk, who did the hardest thing possible and said it out loud.”

Greene’s reaction put her in a distinct minority among influential conservative figures. Almost immediately after Kirk was declared dead, many of her comrades on the right — the billionaire Elon Musk, the Fox News host Jesse Watters, the podcaster Steve Bannon — described the killing an act of war by the left and exhorted their audience to think in similar terms. But Greene — who for years took a back seat to no one when it came to reactionary rhetoric, going so far, before she was in office, as to accuse Democrats, including Speaker Nancy Pelosi, of treasonous conduct and adding that treason was punishable by imprisonment or death — realized that she had suddenly lost all appetite for vengeance. She later told a friend, who confirmed the exchange: “After Charlie died, I realized that I’m part of this toxic culture. I really started looking at my faith. I wanted to be more like Christ.”

That was when the stress fracture that had been steadily widening between Greene and her political godfather became an irrevocable break. She had increasingly taken stands apart from the president and the Republican Party: declaring the war in Gaza a “genocide”; objecting to cryptocurrency and artificial-intelligence policies that, from her perspective, prioritized billionaire donors over working-class Americans; criticizing the Trump administration for approving foreign student visas, for enacting tariffs that hurt businesses in her district and for allowing Obamacare subsidies to expire.

Most significant, she defied the president and compliant House Republican leaders as she argued that all investigative material pertaining to Jeffrey Epstein should be released. “The Epstein files represent everything wrong with Washington,” Greene told me in December. “Rich, powerful elites doing horrible things and getting away with it. And the women are the victims.”

As Greene made her opinions known, first to Trump and his team and then publicly, she tested the affection of the man who once said of her in a posted statement endorsing her re-election: “Marjorie Taylor Greene is a warrior in Congress. She doesn’t back down, she doesn’t give up, and she has ALWAYS been with Trump."

Marjorie Taylor Greene was an enthusiastic regular at Donald Trump’s rallies since the day after she was sworn into office in January 2021. Now the cascade of perceived transgressions culminated in the president’s tarring her as “Marjorie ‘Traitor’ Green” in a social media post on Nov. 15, 2025.

Six days later, she announced in a video that she would resign from Congress on Jan. 5, a year before her term ends."

I have covered Greene, who is 51, extensively over the past five years, and it was evident during this recent visit that on one level nothing had changed.

Just outside the front door of her office stood the familiar placard blaring, “There are TWO genders: MALE & FEMALE.”

One sign on the door warned visitors that “NO FOREIGN LOBBYING” was allowed; another featured the image of Charlie Kirk. And hanging on the wall inside the waiting area were fan letters from all over America, some dating back to 2021, her first year in office. The television was, as always, set to Fox News, though Greene told me she no longer watched the network because she found it "factually unreliable." [Editor's Note: That's why I started watching Newsmax.]

The fact that her office remained the same reflected Greene’s sense of where she stood: She continued to be faithful to Trump’s campaign promises. If anything, she said, her sin was to have regarded them as more than slogans. “That’s what I’m guilty of,” she told me. “That’s what made me, in the president’s words, a traitor — which was truly believing in Make America Great Again, which I perceive to be America First.”

Greene’s last exchange with the president was by text message on Nov. 16. That day, she received an anonymous email in her personal Gmail account that threatened her college-aged son: “Derek will have his life snuffed out soon. Better watch his back.” The email’s subject heading used the nickname Trump had given her the day before: “Marjorie Traitor Greene.”

Greene promptly texted that information to the president. According to a source familiar with the exchange, his long reply made no mention of her son. Instead, Trump insulted her in personal terms. When she replied that children should remain off limits from their disagreements, Trump responded that she had only herself to blame.

In response to detailed questions and a request for comment, Davis Ingle, a White House spokesman, wrote in a statement: “President Trump remains the undisputed leader of the greatest and fastest growing political movement in American history — the MAGA movement. On the other hand, Congresswoman Greene is quitting on her constituents in the middle of her term and abandoning the consequential fight we’re in — we don’t have time for her petty bitterness.”

The president’s banishment of Greene can be viewed as the most recent of several cracks in a MAGA coalition that seemed shatterproof after Trump’s re-election in 2024.

The president’s brash Inauguration Day of a “golden age” has not borne out for most Americans. With polling increasingly showing a drop in his approval ratings and in the Republican forecast for next year’s midterm elections, a few voices on the right have dared to openly question the president’s judgment, even while fighting among themselves over how best to interpret and execute “America First.” Among them, Greene may be the least likely of Trump’s conscientious objectors.

The congresswoman discussed her break with President Trump and her journey from MAGA zealot to political isolation. It has been tempting for some observers to predict that the meteoric crash and burn of the MAGA movement’s loudest champion signals the beginning of the end for its leader as well. But it is Greene who is exiting the stage, while Trump continues to dominate it, as he did through impeachments and indictments and other controversies that no other politician would have survived.

Greene acknowledged to me that her abrupt ejection from Trump’s orbit is unlikely to diminish his stature with his party or its base. “He has trash-talked so many people,” Greene told me. “I promise you, I don’t hold myself up as more special than others he’s done this to. I get it. This is Trump. This is what he does.”

Still, her five-year trajectory on the national scene — from the president’s embrace to her excommunication — serves as an apt parable for this political moment. If Trump engendered loyalty on an unprecedented scale, Greene was his most fervent high-profile loyalist — and now, his most unlikely apostate. She arrived in Washington as one kind of misfit and departs as another, all while remaining more or less herself, but also changing in ways that compelled even her detractors to give her a second look. None of this is normal, like the rest of the Trump era.

But because it represents an evolution for Greene, she may yet again prove to be a harbinger of a sea change in the movement she once helped lead: during its weirdest time, as its weirdest character: a former believer in the QAnon conspiracy theory, a CrossFit competitor and a wealthy co-owner of her family’s construction firm with no political experience, now jetting around on Air Force One with the president of the United States, endeavoring to overturn the 2020 election results. Three days after Greene was sworn into office in January 2021, the Capitol fell siege to rioters trying to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory. According to Greene, she found herself sequestered with other House members in a conference room and arguing with another Republican freshman, Kat Cammack of Florida.

“B.L.M. and antifa have broken into the Capitol!” Greene insisted."

Grabbing Greene’s shoulders, Cammack replied firmly: “Marjorie. They’re wearing MAGA hats.” [Editor's Note: Was that all the proof she needed?]

Early that February, I stood outside the Capitol watching Greene hold a news conference. The day before, 11 Republicans joined with a unanimous Democratic House majority in voting to strip Greene of her committee assignments for the incendiary remarks she made before running for office. Now she defiantly, against all conventional wisdom, said that her adversaries had it wrong about Trump’s demise, and that the base had not deserted the exiled former president: “The party is his. It doesn’t belong to anybody else.”

At the time, frankly, I thought she sounded nuts. But as the year wore on, Greene’s prescience would become as evident as her emerging star power in the MAGA ecosystem, and I became convinced that in order to understand that ecosystem, it was essential to understand this figure at the heart of it. After months of background interviews with her top aides, I got word that she was willing to meet with me.

Early in 2022, I traveled to Rome, Georgia, which is in the northwestern corner of the state where the congresswoman lived. When her aides nervously buttonholed me in the doorway of the restaurant where Greene and I were due to meet and muttered that everything would have to be off the record, I realized how tenuous the situation was. Greene, a prolific user of the term “fake news media,” had never sat down with a Times reporter before. It occurred to me that the sum total of what she knew about this news organization, and others like it, came from Fox News and the confederates in her impermeable MAGA bubble. In her world, mainstream media outfits were perpetrators of the “Russia hoax” and were in league with the Democrats. She ignored them and distrusted them.

"What brings you to Rome?” she asked as she shook my hand. When I replied, “I’m just here to see you,” she blinked in surprise. It seemed to be a source of relief, if perhaps somewhat discombobulating, that I also had a Southern accent and was more interested in her current political beliefs than her previous statements. That none of her off-the-record remarks to me that day appeared in print or on social media further reduced her wariness.

Other on-the-record interviews soon followed — a few in her office, one back in her district and a couple in Washington restaurants. One autumn evening in 2022, I ventured to ask just how she thought the 2020 election was stolen. Did she really think that a grand conspiracy, perhaps masterminded by the Obamas and the C.I.A., had secretly rigged the results?

She asked: "Do you really think Joe Biden got 81 million votes without even campaigning?”

“Yes,” I said. “They counted all the votes. That was the final tally. Why wouldn’t I believe it?” The look she then gave me, which I will never forget, was one of bottomless pity. [Editor's Note: Maybe because he didn't understand that just re-counting counterfeit or invalid ballots is NOT an real "audit".Or maybe he was just playing dumb.]

I soon became accustomed to the “Is she as crazy as she seems?” queries from the same friends and peers who 15 years earlier had asked me, while I was spending time with President George W. Bush, if he was as stupid as he appeared. The answer was a qualified "no". Greene did harbor a genuine conspiratorial streak, often even wondering if this or that person wore a wire. But she was also becoming an increasingly shrewd and acerbic observer of life on Capitol Hill. By January 2023, the Republicans had reclaimed the House and Greene had developed a strong alliance with the new speaker, Kevin McCarthy, who bestowed on her an unofficial seat at the leadership table. Through it all, Greene remained a Trump die-hard. She first visited him at Mar-a-Lago in March 2021, a time when many other elected Republicans were keeping their distance. Three months later, when Trump staged his first rally since leaving office, Greene was there as his warm-up act in Ohio.

As a matter of fact, she'd say things like, "He’s the greatest president this country has ever had. And he should be our president right now — but the dirty, rotten Democrats stole the election!” Trump in return would say, “She’s loved and respected, and she’s tough and smart and kind.

She said, "Our side has been trained by Donald Trump to never apologize and to never admit when you’re wrong.’"

While others in her party kept their options open as Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, entered the field for the 2024 presidential election, Greene’s allegiances were not up for debate. And Trump took notice.

By early 2022, she would tell me Trump had floated the idea of her as his 2024 running mate. That rolling discussion continued into the summer of 2024, she says, but Trump, she claims, was bothered by her steadfast opposition to abortion, which she has called “murder.” (A White House spokeswoman said that Greene was never under consideration. Vice President JD Vance also opposes abortion, but has deferred to Trump’s preference to leave the matter up to the states.) She ultimately joined Tucker Carlson, Charlie Kirk and Donald Trump Jr. as early advocates of Vance, then a first-term senator from Ohio. According to an aide, Greene would end up spending roughly $1 million from her own war chest to campaign for Trump’s re-election. (Editor's Note: Greene is a multi-millionaire through the family construction business.]

Greene’s fidelity to the MAGA cause masked some private misgivings, she now says. Some of Trump’s devotees struck Greene as worshipful in the extreme: “For a lot of MAGA, Trump is a savior, and he’s like a god to them.” She also disliked the unctuous, hedonistic posturing at Mar-a-Lago. In particular, she told me recently: “I never liked the MAGA Mar-a-Lago sexualization. I believe how women in leadership present themselves sends a message to younger women.”

She continued: “I have two daughters, and I’ve always been uncomfortable with how those women puff up their lips and enlarge their breasts. I’ve never spoken about it publicly, but I’ve been planning to.” Still, for everything that gave her pause about Trump and the MAGA faithful, there was always the LEFT to remind Greene of what she found truly appalling.

By 2024, Greene had become more politically sophisticated and also less inclined to vilify the news media. But she continued to criticize Trump’s Democratic opponents, and their positions, in the direst of terms: “radical communist Kamala Harris!" — “the perverted trans agenda against children that is an attack directly on God’s creation!” — “the party of pedophiles!”

The day after the assassination attempt on Trump in Pennsylvania that July, just days before the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, where he would receive the party’s official nomination, Greene [EDITOR'S NOTE: ----- NOT REDACTED, JUST MISSING TEXT IN EDITING ----- SORRY!]

I had plans to meet Greene for a drink on the second day of the convention. An hour before we were to get together, she texted me to say she received a better offer: Trump had asked her to sit next to him that evening. As she sat beside the man she called in her own convention speech the founding father of the America First movement,” Greene’s status as the Athena figure in that movement was on display for all to see.

At the height of her mutually supportive relationship with Trump, Greene spoke at the 2024 Republican National Convention, where she also sat with him. In turn, Greene’s belief in her MAGA Zeus was nearly absolute. Shortly after Trump secured the nomination, I convened a dinner with Greene; her boyfriend, Brian Glenn, now the White House correspondent for the right-wing outlet Real America’s Voice; and two of my fellow Times reporters. At one point, I mentioned Trump’s pledge to enact “retribution” against his perceived enemies. Greene’s demeanor turned icy. President Trump, she crisply informed me, was focused on saving America, not payback. Any suggestion to the contrary was asinine. She warned me that if my colleagues and I continued to pursue this ridiculous line of inquiry, she would get up and leave.

More than a year after that dinner, I asked Greene: “Was there ever a point before 2025 where you thought: 'You know what? Trump acts like a man of the people, and he talks about the forgotten men and women of this country, but I’m not so sure.'”

“I was just so naïve and outside of politics,” Greene said with a wince of a smile, “that it was easy for me to naïvely believe.”

But the year that would end with a seismic political rupture between Greene and Trump began with nothing but good vibes. “I can’t wait to get to work!”

Greene announced, in a news release on Jan. 17, 2025, just three days before Trump was sworn in for the second time, that she was newly elected to a third term herself and had been named chairwoman of the House Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency, or the DOGE subcommittee, which was set up to work in lock step with Elon Musk’s fund-slashing agency to downsize the federal government. Now, at last, Republicans controlled both the executive and legislative branches. Greene’s brash assessment of Trump in early 2021 that “the party is his” was, if anything, an understatement.

Greene’s eagerness to get to work became all too evident to the new administration. She sent long, insistent text messages to Trump’s chief of staff, Susie Wiles, along with her deputy, James Blair, and cabinet members. Greene’s congressional staff had long been accustomed to her I-will-not-be-ignored tactics, a playbook they jokingly referred to as “bitch, bully and bulldoze.”

But these recipients were the most powerful government officials in America, and in retrospect, the personal slights between her and them may have foreshadowed the ill feelings that would ensue. According to a person with knowledge of the matter, Greene’s missives could come off as pushy, unconstructive and at times disrespectful. “She wasn’t as prolific with me as she apparently was with others,” Wiles told me. “I would sometimes know when she texted the president because I’d be dispatched to do something she was asking for. I couldn’t get to all of her texts, but I acted when I could.”

From Greene’s perspective, the new White House team consisted mainly of latecomers to the MAGA movement, not Day 1 Trumpists like herself. Greene harbored suspicions that Wiles and Blair were a little too cozy with the billionaire donor class — and that in a contest between competing interests, the president’s MAGA faithful would be left out in the cold.

Greene was also chagrined to discover that the Republican-controlled House, under Speaker Mike Johnson, seemed to have no say in Trump’s agenda. “I want you to know that Johnson is not our speaker,” she told me in December. “He is not our leader. And in the legislative branch — a totally separate body of government — he is literally 100 percent under direct orders from the White House. And many, many Republicans are so furious about that, but they’re cowards.”

Hardly the first to discover that the House had in recent years become a marvel of inaction, Greene nonetheless began to wonder whether serving in it was worth all the family events she had missed and the death threats she had incurred. She considered running against Senator Jon Ossoff but in May that she had decided not to Greene’s stated reasoning at the time was that “the Senate is where good ideas go to die.”

But the week after her announcement, The Wall Street Journal that Trump had shared with her a survey from his pollster, Tony Fabrizio, projecting that Ossoff would beat her by 18 points. Later, Trump would in a Truth Social post that their split “seemed to all begin” when he sent her the poll — suggesting, in effect, that Greene was pouting over his lack of support: “All I see ‘Wacky’ Marjorie do is COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN!” Greene insisted to me, “It wasn’t about a Fabrizio poll.” She added: “I never had a single conversation with the president about it. Instead, he told me all the time, ‘You should run for governor — you’d win.’”

Still, Greene told me, it began to dawn on her that when it came to the president, loyalty is “a one-way street — and it ends like whenever it suits him.” Being disabused of the idea that subservience would be rewarded appeared to have a liberating effect on her.

In June, Greene did an about-face on the president’s One Big Beautiful Bill after that she voted for it without realizing that it contained a provision that would prevent states from enforcing restrictions on artificial intelligence for a period of 10 years. If the Senate did not strike the moratorium from the bill, Greene publicly warned, “when the O.B.B.B. comes back to the House for approval after Senate changes, I will not vote for it with this in it.”

On July 1, the Senate severed the provision from the bill, which Trump signed into law three days later.

Greene broke again from Trump on July 17, arguing on X that his cryptocurrency bill could permit a future president to “TURN OFF YOUR BANK ACCOUNT AND STOP YOUR ABILITY TO BUY AND SELL!!!!!” This time, Trump made his displeasure known to her — and to her peers when Greene and her staff were at the Capitol complex in mid-December, when she cast her final vote on her last day working in Washington.

That same day, Greene and roughly a dozen other House Republicans who also had reservations about the bill were summoned to the Oval Office. In Greene’s recollection, Trump focused his wrath on her. “When you have a group of kids,” she said, “you pick the one that is the most well behaved, that always does everything right, and you beat the living shit out of them. Because then the rest of them are like: ‘Oh, man, holy shit. If Dad does that to her, what would he do to me?’” A White House spokeswoman disputes that the meeting was contentious. “Not surprising to me at all,” Greene replied when I informed her of this. “They have major problems, and it’s only starting to build.”

Greene believed that she was being true to the candidate, the ideals and the voters she campaigned for. “What have I been doing since he became president? I’ve worked very hard to keep everybody inside the guardrails of what we campaigned on: No, is what we said. This is what we promised. Now we have to deliver. And not through executive orders or red-meat rants on social media.’ And I always go back to the people that showed up at his rallies, because those are the people that should matter. Those people should matter over those big crypto donors or the A.I. big-tech people."

Greene had other reservations about the administration’s agenda. While she was initially supportive of Trump’s tariffs, she became fretful when carpet and flooring companies in her district said they were now less able to procure certain chemicals that were available only overseas. She complained that the hundreds of thousands of college student visas being issued by the administration to Chinese nationals gave them an unfair leg up on American students. And though Trump campaigned on ending transgender medical care for children, as president, she says, he offered little support to Greene’s bill, the Protect Children’s Innocence Act, which would do exactly that. Only when Greene threatened to oppose the continuing resolution in September to fund the government did the House majority leader, Steve Scalise, promise to bring her bill to the House floor in exchange for her vote.

Such acts of obstinance probably got under Trump’s skin, Greene told me. “But,” she then said, “it was Epstein. Epstein was everything.”

During the 2024 campaign, Trump indicated a willingness to release all files pertaining to his former friend Jeffrey Epstein, who died in prison in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges. Greene now says it didn’t register with her at the time that Trump never exhibited much relish for the subject — and, for that matter, that numerous photos had circulated showing him palling around with Epstein.

The reason for her lack of concern, as Greene explained it to me, might seem improbable to anyone who is unfamiliar with how the mainstream press and the right-wing media cover the same story differently — or not at all. “The story to me,” she said, “was that I’d seen pictures of Epstein with all these people. And Trump is just one of several. And then, for me, I’d seen that Bill Clinton is on the flight logs for his plane like 20-something times. So, for people like me, it wasn’t suspicious. And then we’d heard the general stories of how Epstein used to be a member of Mar-a-Lago, but Trump kicked him out. Why would I think he’s done anything wrong, right?”

For Greene, the decades that Epstein spent eluding justice for exploiting and sexually assaulting countless girls and young women while amassing a fortune, and the seeming efforts by the government to cover up the injustice, “represents everything wrong with Washington,” she told me. This September, Greene spoke with several of Epstein’s victims for the first time in a closed-door House Oversight Committee meeting. She knew that the women had paid their own way to come to Washington. She saw some of them trembling and crying as they spoke. Their accounts struck her as entirely believable. Greene herself had never been sexually abused, but she knew women who had. In her own small way, Greene later told me, she could understand what it was like for a woman to stand up to a powerful man."

"Am I going to get murdered, or one of my kids, because he’s calling me a traitor?"

After the hearing, Greene held a news conference at which she threatened to identify some of the men who had abused the women. (Greene says that she didn’t know those names herself but that she could have gotten them from the victims.) Trump called Greene to voice his displeasure. Greene was in her Capitol Hill office, and according to a staff member, everyone in the suite of rooms could hear him yelling at her as she listened to him on speakerphone. Greene says she expressed her perplexity over his intransigence. According to Greene, Trump replied, “My friends will get hurt.”

When she urged Trump to invite some of Epstein’s female victims to the Oval Office, she says, he angrily informed her that they had done nothing to merit the honor. It would be the last conversation Greene and Trump would ever have.

Rather than back down, Greene did something she had never done before as a congresswoman: She teamed up with a Democrat, Representative Ro Khanna of California, as well as the Republican maverick Thomas Massie, on a legislative maneuver that would compel the Justice Department to release all documents pertaining to Epstein. To say that Khanna — a progressive Democrat who had joined his colleagues four years earlier in voting to strip Greene of her committee assignments — did not regard Greene as a natural ally, was an understatement." Representative Thomas Massie was standing behind a lectern with microphones and a red sign that reads “Epstein Files Transparency Act.” Representatives Ro Khanna and Marjorie Taylor Greene were slightly behind him.

“I had the same caricatured opinion of her as everyone,” Khanna told me. “I saw her heckling President Biden at the State of the Union address. I thought she was a person on the fringes. But my view of her completely changed. At our press conferences, she didn’t even seek to speak. She was genuinely moved by the survivors, so much so that we hugged each other during one woman’s testimony. I found her to be a person of integrity and courage, considering the pressure she faced from the White House.”

The effort by Greene, Khanna and Massie to force the release of the Epstein files stalled in October, when a budget impasse caused the federal government to shut down. (For Speaker Johnson, who was allied with Trump in opposing the release of the Epstein files, the shutdown enabled him to avoid seating Adelita Grijalva, a newly elected Democrat from Arizona who would have provided the decisive 218th vote to ratify Greene’s legal maneuver.) Congress had already been in recess from July 28 to Sept. 2.

Now the Capitol was shuttered until Nov. 12. Greene spent most of this extended time back home in Georgia. “For the entire eight weeks,” she recalled, “I am raging. I am losing my mind. And when I would come back up here, I would give everybody in leadership hell. This is the most absurd thing I’ve ever seen. The American people work every day. Why are we not working?” From conversations with her constituents, she told me, she could tell that the issue of affordability was not, as Trump would term it, “perpetrated by Democrats".

Reading construction-industry newsletters, Greene learned that private-equity firms were buying up neighborhoods in Georgia and across America, which in turn was driving up housing costs. Her two adult daughters informed her that their health-insurance premiums would double if Greene’s party did not yield to the Democrats and extend the Obamacare subsidies that had been significantly expanded by the Biden administration.

Greene told me that she began to worry that her beloved MAGA movement was going off the rails. Its leading figures were no longer preoccupied with the pressing economic needs of her constituents. Instead, they were bickering over the Epstein files. “How did all of this end up to a point,” she recalls wondering at the time, “where it was about releasing files about women who were raped, and not the serious things that I think truly matter about helping to get our economy stabilized again? Help reduce the cost of living, fix the housing market, fix health insurance — for the love of God, what the [expletive] is the matter with these people?”

Greene decided to go public with her grievances. Her options were limited, however. She still had limited relations with the mainstream press. And while she had once been a regular on Tucker Carlson’s show on Fox News and had occasionally appeared on others, the right-wing media giant had otherwise kept her at arm’s length — perhaps because, Greene told me, “I’m not for their foreign wars. I won’t say, ‘Kill everybody in Gaza.’” She added: “And I said the election was stolen. Oh, and I said I’m against Covid vaccines, and all their ads are big pharma companies.” (A Fox News source confirmed Greene’s suspicion that her appearances had been held to a minimum by the network. A Fox News spokeswoman said that Greene appeared on the network a few times earlier in the year and had been invited to appear on “Fox & Friends” the day after she announced she was resigning from Congress.)

But a few unlikely venues had reached out to Greene, and now she responded to them. On Oct. 31, she appeared on “Real Time With Bill Maher,” the Friday night HBO show hosted by the contrarian commentator who had frequently lampooned her. Greene had never watched the show and did not know that she would be facing a live audience.

“Brian” — her boyfriend — “said I looked like a deer in the headlights” when she appeared onstage, she told me. But Greene quickly regained her composure. “Yeah, I disagree with that,” she said flatly when Maher raised Trump’s $40 billion bailout to Argentina. Asked about Trump’s desire to resume nuclear testing, Greene replied, “I would vote no to that.” When Greene criticized her party for failing to offer a viable alternative to Obamacare, the audience erupted in applause.

Four days later, she joined the hosts of “The View,” ABC’s popular morning show that takes a mostly liberal stance. One person who was on the set told me that the hosts were braced for combative dialogue, but Greene told me that she instantly felt comfortable in their company. “Those women were the same type of women that have always been my friends. College-educated, affluent suburban women — that’s who I am. So I couldn’t wait to talk to these ladies. I was so tired of the toxic politics.”

She said she instantly felt comfortable in the company of the liberal-leaning hosts. Still, Greene told me, she had no illusions about how her media mini-tour would be received in the White House. “All of a sudden, I’m in places” — Greene made her voice sound stern to mimic disapproving Republican leaders — “‘that you’re not supposed to be, little M.T.G. You get back in your little [expletive] box in the kitchen and shut up and cook us dinner and stay there.’"

On the evening of Nov. 14, she and Brian Glenn were at her home in Rome when Trump’s Truth Social post rescinding his endorsement of her popped up. The next morning, they read Trump’s new post calling her a “traitor” in shared disbelief. “Traitor,” she says she told Glenn. “Traitors are put in prison or put to death. That’s what he just called me.”

"Later that day, a bomb threat was called in to her family’s construction firm in Alpharetta. The day after that, Rome police officers informed her of a pipe bomb threat to her house. After texting the president with the information about the threat to her son and receiving his hostile reply, she sent it to the vice president. “He was very sympathetic and kind,” Greene told me. She reached out to others in the administration as well. In one text that a White House official read to me, Greene wrote, “Trump replied in the worst kind of way.” The president had endangered her family, she went on, “and none of you even gives a shit.”

That same day, Nov. 16, Greene appeared on the CNN program “State of the Union,” co-hosted by Dana Bash. The congresswoman was uncharacteristically somber, describing the threats she received. Bash referred to a recent post by Greene on X saying that Trump had unleashed a “hotbed of threats” against her. The CNN host then pointed out the long history of Trump’s attacks on others.

And with respect, Bash said, "I haven’t heard you speak out about it until it was directed at you.”

“Dana, I think that’s fair criticism,” Greene replied. “And I would like to say, humbly, I’m sorry for taking part in the toxic politics.”

I asked Greene in December to specify what she was referring to. There was a manifestly pugnacious side to her, I said, and I referred her to the period when, just before running for office, she was a far-right social media influencer practicing what she called “confrontational politics.”

She harassed the 18-year-old gun-control activist David Hogg on the street and roamed the halls of Congress, writing “You’re a traitor” in the guest book outside Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s office and barging into Pelosi’s office to chant “Lock her up!”

“We were terrifying everyone,” she boasted at the time in a video she posted on Facebook. And she went further, posting more videos that called Pelosi a “traitor” who deserved to either face prison or “suffer death.”

Was that the toxic politics she meant? “Yeah!” she exclaimed. “I was an angry citizen. An angry American.” She thought, she continued, that “Americans have to go through all this crap, constantly being lied to.” She went on: “And when I got here to Congress, I was attacked relentlessly and was enduring real pain in my personal life” — referring to her father’s brain cancer, which proved fatal, followed by the dissolution of her marriage. “And my emotions were just really raw.”

“And so, when you were apologizing about your role in the toxic politics,” I asked, “you were thinking about the times when your anger got the better of you, like the stuff about A.O.C. and Pelosi?”

“Yeah!” she exclaimed again. “Because a Christian shouldn’t be that way. And I’m a Christian.”

Greene’s fiancé, Brian Glenn, a White House correspondent for a right-wing outlet, helped her produce her surprise statement announcing she would quit Congress.

If Greene’s apology to Bash struck some as belated or insufficient, many on the right saw it as the sort of contrition that was unbecoming of a true MAGA warrior. Greene’s sudden isolation became evident on the afternoon of Nov. 18, when the Epstein Files Transparency Act finally made it to the House floor — after Trump abandoned the fight in the face of pressure brought by Greene, Massie and two more Republicans, Nancy Mace and Lauren Boebert.

"They brought Lauren Boebert into the Situation Room — that was so weird,” Greene recalled of the White House attempts to persuade the holdouts to cave and cast their votes against bringing the bill to the floor. “And they were calling Nancy Mace nonstop. She’s running for governor. She has an endorsement on the line. I give them both a lot of credit.”

That Massie was the only male Republican to side with Epstein’s victims on the vote was notable, Greene added. “There’s a significant reason why women overwhelmingly don’t vote Republican,” she said. “I think there’s a very big message here.”

In what should have been her moment of triumph (after Trump relented and threw his support behind the bill, it being 427 to 1), Greene sat by herself in the House chamber.Melanie Stansbury, the ranking Democratic member of Greene’s DOGE subcommittee, took notice. Though the two women agreed on very little, Stansbury told me, “I think it was very brave for her to stand up to the president and to stand with the victims. And the way the president went after her, in my opinion, was very similar to the way those women were attacked. So when I saw her sitting alone, I went and sat with her on the floor, and I checked in with her to see if she was safe.”

Greene wasn’t entirely sure. “Am I going to get murdered, or one of my kids, because he’s calling me a traitor?” she wondered. She also wondered about her political options. A part of her relished the prospect of destroying a Republican opponent anointed by Trump in the 2026 primary for the seat she held. But to what end? She thought of her constituents, like her neighbor across the street, a nice lady who supported both Greene and Trump but would soon be inundated with TV ads demanding that she choose one over the other. She thought of what it would be like to return to Washington as a marked woman, in what would most likely be a Democratically controlled House, in a legislative branch that accomplished nothing, in a city that she despised.

She was still turning things over in her head on the morning of Friday, Nov. 21, as she flew back home from Washington. By early afternoon, she was at home in Rome, typing on her laptop. Glenn sat beside her, offering a few edits. She called her three children and her chief of staff, Ed Buckham — and no one else. Then Glenn helped load up her text on a teleprompter. She sat on her living-room couch and spoke to the camera for 14 minutes. The second take felt right to her. Greene posted it at 8:01 p.m. and Glenn forwarded it to me — along with other members of the media — two minutes later.

Though Greene knew that her announcement would amount to major news, she did not anticipate the full breadth of the reaction. Her phone lit up with messages from former friends, former in-laws, third cousins and others she had not heard from in years, since she had left her life behind to become a MAGA warrior. “And,” she recalled, “they were like: ‘Hell yeah! F*ck Trump!”

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” Greene told me in mid-December, contemplating her future as she sipped a glass of red wine over dinner at a restaurant in downtown Washington. Almost to herself, she added, “I need a break.”

Sitting beside her was Glenn, who in a few days would become her fiancé and start making plans to move to Georgia from Washington. I agreed not to quote him, given that his job as the White House correspondent for Real America’s Voice has been to show unflagging support for Trump — and he was not in the mood to stay on script. More than any other journalist, Glenn has enjoyed extraordinary and sustained proximity to the president over the past year. It’s fair to say that nothing Greene has said or done in recent months has been met with his stern disagreement.

Some have wondered if Greene is conducting something of a redemption tour to reposition herself for the future. Such speculation presupposes that she has a kind of master plan in mind — and, for that matter, an abiding interest in politics as a vocation. But weeks after announcing her intention to resign from Congress, Greene emphatically maintained that she was leaving that world for good. “I hate politics,” she texted me — then added, “Hate it!!!” Even if Greene reconsiders her antipathy down the line, she acknowledged to me that she is, for the moment at least, politically homeless. “I’m, like, radioactive,” she said of her House colleagues on both sides of the aisle. 

Instead, she spoke longingly of the day when she could walk unnoticed into a restaurant or a grocery store. Recalling a conversation she had with the host of “60 Minutes” who interviewed her, she said: “The funniest thing was when Lesley Stahl said, ‘You know, it’s hard to give up the limelight.’ I’m looking across at her, and I’m thinking,‘I don’t ever want to be like that when I’m her age.’”

And yet, Greene was showing no sign of withdrawing from political life. She continued to post on social media about her concerns on immigration, Covid vaccines, foreign interventions and the prospect of stolen elections. She was also still paying close attention to Trump, if from a more jaded perspective than before. During dinner, when Glenn brought up the president’s interactions with the White House press corps that day, Greene noted Trump’s amiable exchange with a female reporter — after several recent instances of his responding with insults to questions from women. “It’s because he knows he has a woman problem,” she said.

His overall behavior in recent months, she told me, was that of a president who would stop at nothing to remain in office even after his second term expires. “In my opinion,” Greene predicted, “we’re going to see more war. Because what do you do when you really lose power, when you become a lame duck? How do you cling to power? You go to war.”

Even without another campaign on the horizon or a donor base to rile up — even without being M.T.G., in other words — she was leaving Washington as the same polarizing figure who arrived in town five years earlier. When I asked Stansbury, the Democratic congresswoman, if she felt at all wistful about Greene’s abrupt departure, given that the two had developed a mutual respect and that other Democrats were interested in working with her, she paused for several seconds before finally saying: “I don’t think that’s an answerable question. What I can point you to is that just this week she used her remaining policy leverage on the vote over the N.D.A.A. to advance a bill that is anathema to the basic core values of civil rights in America.”

Stansbury was referring to the fact that a few hours before sitting down to dinner, Greene announced that in exchange for her vote to allow the National Defense Authorization Act to fund the Pentagon to come to the floor, the House leadership had agreed to finally bring her bill banning gender-related care for minors to the floor a week later. (It passed, 216 to 211, though its fate in the Senate is tenuous at best.)

That should have been all the information Stansbury needed to be glad that Greene was resigning. What complicated the matter was that Stansbury had come to see other qualities in Greene, including ones she finds commendable; Greene had treated her respectfully and had stood by Epstein’s victims when few Republicans would. “At the end of the day, members of Congress are just human beings,” Stansbury concluded. “They deserve to be treated with respect and dignity, even when you disagree with them.” It is likely that Stansbury, who like Greene entered Congress in 2021, would have been much harder pressed back then to muster empathy for the self-styled “angry American” and MAGA foot soldier.

But perhaps even to her own surprise, Greene was not that person any longer. “Everyone’s like, ‘She’s changed,’” Greene said to me. “I haven’t changed my views. But I’ve matured. I’ve developed depth.” And there was more, she said, to the education she’d received. “I’ve learned Washington, and I’ve come to understand the brokenness of the place. If none of us is learning lessons here and we can’t evolve and mature with our lessons, then what kind of people are we?”

MY RELATED VIDEOS

Marjorie Taylor Greene continues her Media Tour - December 30, 2025
https://rumble.com/v73nsd2-marjorie-taylor-greene-continues-her-media-tour-december-30-2025.html?e9s=src_v1_upp_a 

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene resignation speech - Nov. 21, 2025 
https://rumble.com/v7236yy-full-rep.-marjorie-taylor-greene-resignation-speech-nov.-21-2025.html?e9s=src_v1_upp_a 

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on THE VIEW - November 2025 
https://rumble.com/v71hsfu-me-thinks-mtg-is-running-in-the-2028-rnc-primary-november-2025.html?e9s=src_v1_upp_a 

MAGA all-stars break with Trump on Epstein Files - Sept. 3, 2025 
https://rumble.com/v6ygtae-maga-all-stars-break-with-trump-on-epstein-files-sept.-3-2025.html?e9s=src_v1_upp_a

Original Time Article:
  https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/29/magazine/marjorie-taylor-greene-trump-maga-split.html