Democrats on the House Committee on Homeland Security went into a nearly half-hour tizzy after Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene called out her Democrat colleague Rep. Eric Swalwell for his ties to a known Chinese spy, a relationship that led Republicans to boot him from the House Intelligence Committee at the beginning of 2023.
During a hearing featuring Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Swalwell used part of the time Congress dedicated to oversight of the ongoing border crisis to claim that Greene’s “Defund the FBI” merchandise constituted “anti-police rhetoric.”
Greene fired back by accusing the California representative of sleeping with spy Christine Fang, who spent years in California’s Bay Area cultivating deep connections with U.S. Democrat politicians and gathering intelligence on behalf of communist China.
“That was quite entertaining from someone that had a sexual relationship with a Chinese spy and everyone knows it,” Greene said in her opening remarks.
A December 2020 report found that Fang specifically developed a relationship with the Russia hoaxer between 2012 and 2015, when he began serving on the House Intelligence Committee and was named ranking member of its Central Intelligence Agency Subcommittee. Fang reportedly raised millions for Swalwell’s reelection in 2014 and placed at least one intern in his Washington, D.C. office.
Swalwell ultimately refused to disclose to The Federalist whether his relationship with Fang was ever sexual in nature but several sources directly familiar with the counterintelligence investigation of the spy told The Federalist the pair were intimately involved.
Despite evidence that Swalwell associated with a spy for his nation’s No. 1 foreign enemy, Democrats immediately scrambled to sanction Greene for her comment about it.
“I move to take her words down,” Rep. Dan Goldman exclaimed. “Completely inappropriate.”
After his request to delete “everything that the gentlelady from Georgia has said” from the record was rejected by Republican Committee Chairman Mark Green, Goldman requested “the accusations of an affair with a Chinese spy” to be completely nuked from Greene’s questioning time.
“Those are engaging in personalities,” Goldman insisted. “Those words should be taken down and the gentlelady should not be able to speak anymore in this hearing.”
“The latter part of that is not an appropriate motion but we will evaluate the striking of those words,” the chairman promised, before asking Greene if she “would like to retract those words.”
“No, I will not,” Greene replied.
After minutes of searching congressional rules for how to proceed, the chairman ruled that Greene’s comments, no matter how offensive to Democrats, would not “be stricken from the record.”
Before Greene could continue her questioning of the witness, the proceedings were once again interrupted by ranking member Bennie Thompson who moved to appeal the ruling.
Chairman Green took a verbal vote and determined that the motion would be tabled but that wasn’t good enough for Thompson, who demanded a recorded vote, and Goldman, who complained that the chair’s ruling contradicted congressional rules regarding “not engaging in personalities.”
Republican committee members quickly outvoted Democrats to table the motion and proceed with Greene’s questioning.
Even after Greene’s comments were cleared, the drama continued when she called Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas a “liar.”
“How many more people do we have to watch die every single day in America? How many more young people do we have to see die? How many more teenagers, how many more parents cry themselves to sleep at night — if they can even sleep — because their child overdosed on fentanyl?” Greene asked. “How long are you going to continue this outrage, complete outrage where China is poisoning America’s children, poisoning our teenagers, poisoning our young people? How long are you going to let this go on?”
Mayorkas began to “assure you that we’re not letting it go on” but Greene interjected.
“I reclaim my time. You’re a liar. You are letting this go on and the numbers prove it. You can’t lie about the facts, Secretary Mayorkas,” Greene exclaimed. “While you live in denial and sit over there with this attitude that you’re doing everything right, you are killing Americans with your policies. And that is a fact. Your policies are killing people — over 300 Americans a day. Over 300. And it’s outrageous.”
Before Greene could continue her rant about the havoc the Biden administration’s policies have wreaked on the nation, Thompson interrupted the Republican’s time to demand, once again, that the committee punish her.
Vice Chair Michael McCaul asked Greene whether she wished to modify her comments to which the congresswoman replied “I will not withdraw my remarks because the facts show the proof.”
Chairman Green then ruled that Greene was out of line.
“It’s pretty clear that the rules state you can’t impugn someone’s character. Identifying or calling someone a liar is unacceptable in this committee and I make the ruling that we strike those words,” he said.
Democrats, unsatisfied with Green’s willingness to punish one of his own party members, pushed the chairman to end Greene’s speaking time. Greene tried to ask a clarifying question by naming a “point of personal inquiry” but Goldman claimed “there’s no such thing.”
“In consulting the rules of the House, when we strike, it does terminate the time of the individual who is speaking. So the gentlelady is no longer recognized,” Green agreed.
Democrat Rep. Glenn Ivey immediately asked if he could “make a point of inquiry” in which he declared Greene’s comments were not “a statement of fact” and constituted “slander.”
“There’s no statement of fact. It’s bullsh-t,” Goldman chimed in.
Having spent 20 minutes arguing over Greene’s comments, the chairman finally declared the committee would move past them.
“It does not fit the rules by the ruling of the chair and we’ve already voted on that. It is past us. We have the secretary until about 1:30, we’re going to move on,” Green said.
Greene condemned the chairman’s decision to strip her of her time on Twitter.
“Republicans will never defeat the Democrats, we’ll never impeach Mayorkas, we’ll never impeach Biden, and we’ll never implement our conservative agenda if we can’t even call a liar a liar. Republicans should not let Democrats strike down our words and do their bidding for them,” she wrote.
Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire, Fox News, and RealClearPolitics. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.
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