Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), the lone lawmaker seeking judicial fairness for suspects in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riots, criticized her colleagues for failing to back legislative reforms to block “political prosecutions.”
In an interview with Secrets, the lawmaker said, “It should be a Republican priority. And it’s not. It’s not because they really don’t care.”
On Wednesday, during a driving rain shower, Greene announced that she was reintroducing legislation to reform how defendants arrested in political protests are handled. She has charged that non-violent Jan. 6 suspects and those found guilty of a range of riot-related charges have faced overly harsh sentences and jail conditions.
Her Matthew Lawrence Perna Act is named after Matthew Perna, a 37-year-old Sharpsville, Pennsylvania, man who committed suicide while waiting to be sentenced for non-violently entering the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, when riots suspended the certification of President Joe Biden’s election.
His family said that the government’s plan to add more charges to his case pushed him into depression, and he committed suicide.
The legislation is a copy of a bill introduced in 2022 by former Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX). A key element of both would allow a change of venue to move trials out of Washington, D.C., where over 90% vote Democrat and support the prosecution of riot suspects.
Greene said that even former President Donald Trump, who has promised to pardon some of those convicted in Jan. 6 cases, would benefit by having his 2020-election related trial in Washington moved.
At an outdoor press conference, Greene appeared with Perna’s aunt, Geri Perna, who joined in condemning congressional members for not cosponsoring the legislation. Later, she wrote on X, “Thank you @RepMTG for being the ONLY Republican in congress who gives a sh-t about the J6ers!”
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Greene noted that while Republicans have assailed the findings of the Democratic House Jan. 6 investigation, they have failed to back her legislation. “I’m just so frustrated here. You know, last Congress, I called it the ‘House of hypocrites.’ And I think the name still applies,” she told us.
Greene said that she expected the issue to get more sunshine in Congress if Trump is elected back into the White House in the fall. “You know how this game works. It won’t become important to Republicans on the Hill until President Trump is in the White House and is actually doing something about it,” said Greene, who has also visited with Jan. 6 defendants in jail.
