(BSS/AFP) - US lawmaker Marjorie Taylor Greene, an influential figure of the far right, announced Friday she is quitting her seat in Congress, one week after President Donald Trump pulled his support for the former staunch ally.
In a video posted online, the 51-year-old Republican congresswoman from Georgia elected in 2020 said she had "always been despised in Washington DC and never fit in."
Greene said she did not want her supporters and family to endure "a hurtful and hateful primary against me by the President we all fought for, only to fight and win my election while Republicans will likely lose the midterms.
"I will be resigning from office with my last day being January 5, 2026," she said.
Greene had previously been a standard-bearer of Trump`s Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement, but the president announced he was withdrawing all support for "`Wacky` Marjorie" on November 7.
He followed up again the next morning with multiple posts on his Truth Social platform attacking Greene as a "lightweight" and even a "traitor" to the Republican Party.
The former key political ally to Trump subsequently said she was being targeted by a wave of threats.
The shock move by Greene was the clearest sign yet of a growing split in MAGA world, in churn over strong Democratic victories in this month`s off-year elections, and Trump`s chummy White House meeting earlier Friday with leftist mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani.
The movement has been particularly riven over Trump`s flip-flop on the case of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whose web of contacts allegedly included several American elites.
"Standing up for American women who were raped at 14, trafficked and used by rich powerful men should not result in me being called a traitor and threatened by the President of the United States, whom I fought for," Greene said.