Marjorie Taylor Greene Suggests Southerners May Shoot Vaccination Volunteers

Republican Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene suggested to the Alabama Federation of Republican Women on Tuesday that southerners might shoot door-to-door vaccination volunteers associated with the Biden Administration.

Noting that Alabama has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the nation, Greene said, "(Democratic President) Joe Biden wants to come talk to you guys. He's gonna be sending one of his police state friends to your front door."

Greene said that a vaccination volunteer might want to take down a person's name, address, family members' names, phone numbers and "probably ask for your social security number, whether you take the vaccine or not."

"Yeah, well, what they don't know is in the south we all love our Second Amendment rights," she continued. "We're not real big on strangers showing up on our front door, are we? They might not like the welcome they get."

"Second Amendment rights" is often a synonym for the Constitutional right to own guns. The audience chuckled at her comment.

On July 6, Biden mentioned having people go door-to-door to improve community outreach efforts to help more people get vaccinated. However, Greene and other Republicans have said that Biden's plan has authoritarian intentions.

Afterward, Colorado Representative Lauren Boebert tweeted that Biden had "deployed his Needle Nazis." Ohio Representative Jim Jordan said that next, the Biden Administration would go door-to-door to ask whether Americans owned guns. North Carolina Representative Madison Cawthorn said Biden would use his pandemic authority to take away people's guns and Bibles.

On July 8, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki clarified Biden's plan. She said that the door-to-door vaccine volunteers are "local, trusted messengers: doctors, faith leaders, community leaders." The volunteers are there to provide information about the vaccines' benefits and where people can get vaccinated.

"They are not members of the government," Psaki said. "They are not federal government employees. They are volunteers. They are clergy. They are trusted voices in communities who are playing this role and door knocking."

Psaki also later clarified that the federal government has no list of who is vaccinated and who isn't. She clarified this after Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said on July 8 that it's the government's business to know who has been vaccinated. Becerra also said that it's legal to knock on doors.

During her speech in Alabama, Greene also blamed Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), for funding "gain of function" experiments at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). The U.S. has been investigating whether an accident at the WIV may have led to the COVID-19 outbreak.

While Fauci has said that the NIAID has never funded gain-of-function research, he has also admitted under Senate questioning that he can't know for certain how the WIV lab used the NIAID's previous financial aid.

Newsweek contacted Greene's office for comment.

Correction (8/6/2021 5:54 p.m.): This article's headline and introductory paragraph have been changed to accurately reflect that Representative Greene suggested that southerners might shoot vaccination volunteers rather than having literally said it.