Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (2:54)

So who exactly is Marjorie Taylor Greene? How important is she to the MAGA movement and to American politics? We're going to tell you everything you need to know about her. Welcome to AmericasT. AmericasT.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (3:05)

AmericasT.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (3:07)

From BBC News, when Donald Trump calls, they say, yes, sir. Right away, sir. Happy to lick your boot, sir. We are the sickest country in the world.

Kamala Harris (3:16)

Oh, dear.

Commercial Advertiser (3:16)

Are you worried that billionaires are going to go hungry?

Marjorie Taylor Greene (3:19)

Of course the president supports peaceful protests.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (3:21)

What a stupid question.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (3:22)

Are you still talking about Jeffrey Epstein?

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (3:32)

Hello, it's Sarah here in the BBC's bureau in Washington.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (3:35)

And it is Mariana in the worldwide headquarters of AmericasT in London.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (3:38)

And it's Anthony in Nashville, Tennessee, Music City, USA. There's actually a congressional race here, a contested seat, a special election in about a week and a half. It's the only show when you're into elected politics in town. But we'll come back to that towards the end of our podcast.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (3:54)

Yeah, let's start, Anthony, Mariana, with a question that's been sent in from Zach in Scotland who's asking us. With the fallout between MTG and Trump over the ongoing demand for the full release of the Epstein files, we've seen MTG side with the Democrats in the House of Representatives to push for their complete publication. And he goes on to say he was recently watching an interview with former Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger where he discussed how the Republican Party has been been led astray by Trump. Could MTG deepen this divide within the Republican Party? And good question. Could she realistically be a contender for the 2028 presidential election? So these are a lot of the questions that we're going to unpack during this episode, but we should remind everybody why she has been so much in the spotlight this week. Anthony, what is it that's attracted so much attention?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (4:44)

Well, it's the Epstein boat, first and foremost. Marjorie Taylor Greene was one of the Republicans who was most out in front on this issue and has been for a while. I mean, she does kind of have a penchant for conspiracy theories, and she has been talking about the Epstein case for a while, but she was one of the people in the House of Representatives, one of the few Republicans in the House of Representatives who sided with the Democrats to bring this, to force a release of the Epstein file vote in that chamber over the objections of the House Republican leadership, over the objections of Donald Trump. So she had been pushing for this. She had signed that discharge petition. She had been standing with Epstein's victims. And she didn't back down. And actually she became not just critical of Donald Trump on that, but she has stepped up her criticism of Trump in other areas on his trade policy, on his health care policy. So she's become, she's gone from a, a very vocal supporter of Donald Trump to one of his more prominent critics within the Republican Party in the House of Representatives.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (5:50)

Yeah.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (5:51)

And with some of her criticism, it sounds to me, Anthony, as though she's sort of saying that she's actually adhering to real MAGA principles and she's the one putting America first, for instance, and that she feels that it's Donald Trump who has veered off and is spending too much time looking at foreign policy or not concentrating on what real MAGA voters are interested in. She was talking to CNN's Caitlin Collins recently about the cost of living, for instance.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (6:16)

Yeah.

Commercial Advertiser (6:16)

When the president says there's virtually no inflation and that grocery prices are going down. Do you agree with him on that?

Marjorie Taylor Greene (6:23)

No. I go to the grocery store myself. Grocery prices remain high. Energy prices are high. My electricity bills are higher here in Washington, D.C. at my apartment, and they're also higher at my house in Rome, Georgia, higher than they were a year ago. So affordability is a problem.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (6:42)

So that's notable because Marjorie Taylor Greene is direct, directly contradicting Donald Trump. Donald Trump has been saying time and time again that costs are coming down, the economy is getting better, things are bright and shiny, and this is the golden age, a new golden age for America. And here Taylor Greene is saying, no, things are actually getting worse. And the administration, Republicans, need to do more to help those working class voters who delivered the White House to Donald Trump.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (7:09)

And then the other thing that Marjorie Taylor Greene has been talking about a lot over the course of the past week and has made quite a lot of headlines about is when she spoke about how Donald Trump's called her a traitor and she's had lots of threats on social media. It's caused a moment of reflection, not least because she herself has been accused of sort of stoking division on social media on quite a few occasions. And she actually apologized for what she calls toxic politics when she was speaking to Dana Bash on CNN last Sunday.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (7:36)

We have seen these kinds of attacks or criticism from the president at other people. It's not new. And with respect, I haven't heard you speak out about it until it was directed at you, Dana. I think that's fair criticism. And I would like to say humbly, I'm sorry for taking part in the toxic politics, it's very bad for our country, and it's been something I've thought about a lot, especially since Charlie Kirk was assassinated, is that we. I'm only responsible for myself and my own words and actions, and I am going. I am committed, and I've been working on this a lot lately to put down the knives in politics. I really just want to see people be kind to one another. And we need to figure out a new path forward that is focused on the American people, because as Americans, no matter what side of the aisle we're on, we have far more in common than we have differences. And we need to be able to respect each other with our disagreements.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (8:44)

Now, that's a real turnaround for Marjorie Taylor Greene because she's not just now disagreeing with the president on policy, but on approach as well. And she has been one of the most vehement proponents of maga, I think it's fair to say. Anthony, I mean, this is not somebody who has sounded as though she wanted to agreeably disagree in the past, is it? This is somebody who put forward her own views, shall we say, forcefully.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (9:10)

Right, Exactly. I mean, she made her name for herself even before she ran for Congress, where she would show up on Capitol Hill and chase Democratic Congress people around, berating them with questions, yelling at them as they. As they walk from the Capitol Building to their office buildings. I mean, she was in people's face, and she was extremely hostile towards them. And also, this is her campaign video from 2020, when she's getting ready to run for Congress.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (9:36)

I've never run for office before, but I've made all the right enemies. The fake news media hates me, Big tech censors me. The DC Swamp fears me, and George Soros and the Democrats are trying to take me down, but they don't scare me. Socialism does. That's why I'm running and approve this message. President Trump needs bold, fearless allies as he fights to save America and stop socialism.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (10:03)

Now, Marjorie Taylor Greene is not only very good at, and that video is an example of it, very good at what I would often call kind of gaming the algorithms. She's good at creating content that sparks a reaction, whether it's people loving her or hating her. And therefore, it gets likes and views and clicks and it gets out to more people, which is what has made her sort of so visible, I'd say, certainly in the social media world. And quite a core bit of that. And it was hinted at in some of the comments she was making there about people like George Soros, for example, has been some of the very extreme conspiracy theories she has shared. And like, we shouldn't sort of go over these too lightly really, because they're not. There are some kind of theories, unproven theories that people might consider or engage in, but, you know, where there's a kernel of truth and a bit of it ends up being true, and then some of it's false. But some of the stuff that she has posted about and shared her views on has been really out there. Take for example, the idea of staging school shootings. So before she was elected to Congress, she interacted with a Facebook post that was falsely suggesting that the Parkland school shooting that happened in 2018 in Florida was. Was staged in some way. You know, shootings. I mean, I've spent quite a lot of time investigating false conspiracy theories that suggest terror attacks or school shootings have been staged in some way. And they are incredibly distressing for the people who survived those attacks or for the people who, the families of people who lost their lives, you know, in that Parkland shooting, 17 people were killed. And then she also has been a huge, huge, huge advocate for, if that's the right word, QAnon. So QAnon we've spoken about on AmericasT before is this really wide ranging, unfounded conspiracy theory. It says Donald Trump is waging a secret war against Satan worshiping pedophiles in government, business and media. And it goes beyond real examples of powerful people doing bad things. And she has explicitly, in videos, including a YouTube video, praised Q, which is the pseudonym for this figure who would do these Q drops. They were called, so they would be sort of little bits of information that would help you to kind of further the conspiracy theory. And the followers would then start posting about, you know, whatever the Q drop was or the name that had been revealed or that sort of thing. And she said that Q is a patriot, a word that she uses a lot, it is worth saying with QAnon. She has actually tried more recently to distance herself a little bit from it. You know, she has said that she stumbled across QAnon. She sort of got involved in it in 2017, became interested in the theory because she was upset about things. And actually when we think about how what an advocate she's been for the survivors of Jeffrey Epstein, at The heart of QAnon really are concerns about abuse of power and child abuse, paedophilia, all of those things. So it would make sense that that is perhaps what drew her into the theory. But nonetheless, it obviously goes way beyond real Examples like those relating to Jeffrey Epstein.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (12:59)

So, yeah, the conspiracy theory I always remember with Marjorie Taylor Greene was the one that Jewish controlled satellites with lasers were causing the forest fires in California. I mean, that was so patently absurd. But it did show Marjorie Taylor Greene was out there with these conspiracy theories and ones that were, I'd add, tinged with anti Semitism.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (13:22)

Yeah, and it's worth saying that in the original post where Marjorie Taylor Greene posted about these space lasers, she specifically spoke about the Rothschild banking family. Now, these kinds of conspiracy theories about the Rothschilds, for example, are widely viewed as anti Semitic. They're talking about Jewish families and making allegations that are just completely unfounded, contrary to the truth. Marjorie Taylor Greene, after this was pointed out to her and she was accused of spreading anti Semitic theories, ideas went on to say that she didn't know that the Rothschilds were Jewish and that was why she'd made those comments and so on and so forth. But she, she quite frequently has referenced these kinds of families and people in the theories she spreads.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (14:04)

Do we think she really believed the QAnon or the famous business about the space lasers or. I mean, are there people who sincerely believe this stuff?

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (14:14)

I have actually been thinking more recently, particularly with everything around Jeffrey Epstein and what a sort of advocate she has been for survivors, that actually maybe she is a bit more of a true believer than I would have necessarily thought to begin with, mainly because she's benefited politically from sharing these ideas. And so I think probably both things can be true, that it's been useful to her to share these ideas and therefore she's kind of become a bit. She kind of does sort of, sort of believe them now. And if this, if this, you're surrounded by this stuff all the time, it's kind of easy to understand how you start, start to believe it. And her willingness to go sort of toe to toe with Donald Trump perhaps is proof that she is a bit of a true believer in that sense, but also could be because she benefits from again, being opposed to the sort of establishment and the elites and Donald Trump has transformed to now being the kind of establishment that she's against, because otherwise these kind of theories and ideas don't really work for her.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (15:08)

And it's worth saying actually is you see her quite frequently giving press conferences and things with survivors of Jeffrey Epstein's abuse. And you can tell she is genuinely angry about the idea rich and powerful men are getting away with sex trafficking or abusing these women because their names are being covered up. I mean, you can see that she really does actively care about that. And that's why she's been campaigning so hard for the release of the Epstein files and been prepared to break with Donald Trump over it. I mean, I think there is genuine emotion there when you watch her.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (15:40)

Yeah, I think so. We definitely see she cares about this issue and she was willing to put her neck on the line for the, for the victims. And that, as I mentioned before, may have opened the door for her starting to question some of the other things Donald Trump has done. Because if you remember before that, she was definitely, as she says, an avid advocate for Donald Trump. I mean, she was one of the people who, who was out there in front in 2020 challenging the election results when Donald Trump was saying that he didn't actually lose that election to Joe Biden. She wore a Trump 1 mask in the house during the COVID 19 pandemic. She was labeled a future Republican star by Donald Trump. I mean, this was a close relationship. This was one where it felt like Marjorie Taylor Greene in the House of Representatives was Donald Trump's person and was the person there who was the most, most in touch with Donald Trump, what he wanted and what the incoming administration, once they took power, wanted. And now that's not the case.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (16:46)

She established herself within the party before she came to Donald Trump's attention. She was. I mean, she was a Trumper before Trump had backed her, wasn't she?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (16:56)

Right. It was not. Trump made her. I mean, she became a force, particularly online in the ways that Marianne has been talking about. You know, this really effective social media presence, effective mainstream media like Fox News and some of the other conservative outlets, a presence there. Donald Trump recognized that she had this popularity and then boosted her that way and associated with her that way, because Donald Trump has a very good sense for where the base is and who the base likes and then likes to associate with them.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (17:31)

Yeah, that's a really interesting thing to say, Anthony, because of course, she thinks at the moment, over all sorts of issues where she's criticizing Donald Trump, that she's the one who understands where the base is and that he's lost touch with all of the things that he was campaigning on. Because, I mean, there's a list of things, isn't there? We heard her complaining about prices earlier and the affordability issue, but she's been angry that Donald Trump spends, she thinks, too much time on foreign policy and not enough putting America first. She's been critical of the ending of healthcare subsidies, money going to people who otherwise would struggle to afford health insurance. I Mean, there's a whole list of things, isn't there, in which she's actually started, become really critical.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (18:14)

Yeah. And that was a real break in the party line. During the shutdown, Republicans were digging in and objecting to Democrats saying that the health care subsidies expiring at the end of this year was going to be a big issue. And there she was out there, not just on Fox News, but on cnn, some of the other major media outlets saying, no, these health care subsidies are things that my voters, my constituents, Trump voters, really need, and they are going to get hit by these massive increase in their health care costs. And so that made her kind of a Persona non grata among Republicans, too, because she was contradicting the messaging they were putting out.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (18:53)

The first thing we need to do is focus hard on a serious health insurance plan for Americans. This is a crisis. It's like a building that is consumed in fire. The prices increase starting on January 1st first and open enrollment started on November 1st. That should be number one. Number two, we need to dive into a very hard, focused domestic policy that will reduce the cost of living for Americans.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (19:20)

Donald Trump recently said, I made MAGA make America great again. I'm the one who defines this movement. What I believe therefore becomes the movement. Whereas the contrast is Marjorie Taylor Greene is kind of pointing to, you know, these are America first principles. These are MAGA principles. Donald Trump has strayed from. Donald Trump doesn't. Essentially, she's implied this. Donald Trump doesn't make those principles. They exist. Donald Trump tapped into it. That was the source of his success. When he's not in touch with them, then, you know, he needs to be called out. So it is kind of a debate about what MAGA means and the future of maga, because the reality is Donald Trump, and we talked about this on the podcast before Donald Trump. Trump is only going to be in the White House for three more years. And the closer we get to 2028, the more we start thinking about and the more Republicans start thinking about what the movement is going to look like after he's gone. And I think Marjorie Taylor Greene, perhaps astutely, perhaps riskily also, but is trying to put her marker out there early, saying she's one of the first ones to start defining the movement after Trump.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (20:30)

Looking at the coherence in the politics of it all, I think you can sum it up, can't you, by saying that Marjorie Taylor Greene believes she's speaking up for less, well off Americans, the people who feel that they have been left behind over the Last couple of decades, the people who did get very excited about Donald Trump because he was talking about how he could make their lives better, and she feels that he's strayed away from supporting them, and she's gonna carry on speaking up for them. And the very kind of people who voted her in, of course, in Georgia in the first place. But, Anthony, have you a sense, you're in Tennessee, of where the voters are going with this? The people who, you know, thought that they supported both Marjorie Taylor Greene and Donald Trump now have to choose now that mommy and daddy are fighting, as I saw somebody putting it earlier, do they see Marjorie Taylor Greene is speaking up for them and Donald Trump having lost his way?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (21:21)

I've spoken to quite a few Republicans here in Tennessee over the past couple days, and by and large, the feedback I get from them is that this is still Trump country. They don't necessarily agree with Donald Trump on everything. They actually have some issues with him on these H1B immigration visas for skilled workers. They have some questions about the tariffs and how they're impacting the soybean farmers who work around here. They have some questions about affordability and cost of living and how much that's being addressed. But when it comes to Marjorie Taylor Greene and Trump and that feud, they side with Donald Trump. And I really haven't heard much support for Marjorie Taylor Greene kind of cutting away from him. One Republican I talked to a couple hours east of here out in the hill country of Tennessee, he said, Marjorie Taylor Greene is having a midlife crisis. He's not sure what's going on with her, but she's lost her way. And they don't like that kind of outspoken criticism of Donald Trump. So maybe we'll see it start to filter here eventually, because there are some concerns about how Donald Trump is governing some of his policies right now, but it's not showing up in siding with her over Trump in this feud.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (22:37)

Yeah. Although in Georgia, I mean, I heard a lot of voters there saying quite the opposite, and they do seem to support her. I guess that's probably not unusual in her own district, that people would be supportive of her and pay more attention to her possibly than voters in other parts of the country. But, I mean, do we don't think she would struggle to get reelected next year, do we, Anthony?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (22:59)

I think there'd have to be a credible Republican opponent to her in the primaries in that northern Georgia congressional district. And there's been some talk about Laura Loomer, who is an outspoken Trump supporter, probably, you know, even more outspoken, even more of a supporter of Trump than Marjorie Taylor Greene was at her height. But her coming in and running against her, but that doesn't seem like the kind of candidate that could unseat Greene. It would have to be someone who has connections to North Georgia who can run to her right and then beat her in the primary. And I haven't seen anyone coming forward like that yet. Although it will be a test if Donald Trump really decides to put his weight behind her primary opponent, if there is one.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (23:41)

But if Donald Trump can't unseat her, this becomes very interesting, doesn't it? Because that's always been the threat that keeps a lot of Republicans in line in Congress. And the way that Donald Trump can get them to support his ideas and vote the way he wants them to, is by saying, if you don't, if you break with me, I will back another Republican, a primary opponent, and get you unseated. That's the ultimate threat he uses to control his Congress people. So if he cannot do that, if she is allowed to get away with, say, the things she has been and cruises to reelection, that's really going to take away quite a lot of his power over his own party, isn't it?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (24:19)

Yeah, that's the fascinating thing about this, is that Donald Trump typically has been able to marshal his base who will go out and support who he says to support or vote against who he targets in the primaries. But right now, on the Epstein files in particular, but perhaps on some of these other issues like immigration, H1B visas, on trade, on affordability, people like Marjorie Taylor Greene and other Republicans feel like they have a better feel for where, where the base is rather than Donald Trump.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (24:50)

And when it comes to that question that Zach asked right at the start about could Marjorie Taylor Greene actually be someone who runs to be president? I mean, do we think that that is something that could happen? Because I, I particularly when I heard her talking about the toxic politics thing and, and really changing her mind on that, it felt much more presidential, if that's the right adjective, than the way that she would normally speak. It felt like she actually, and maybe that is one of the impacts of Charlie Kirk's killing, as she highlighted that. Actually, politicians like her do decide that they want to do politics in a bit of a different way.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (25:22)

It's hard to imagine her surviving a presidential campaign and being taken seriously throughout it. But then again, you know, that's exactly what people said about Donald Trump in 2015 and 2016, isn't it? I mean, just to give You a sense, though, of what she can be like, admittedly, before. Before she started apologizing for toxic politics. Have a listen to this exchange with a Sky reporter, Martha Kellner, when she was daring to ask Marjorie Taylor Greene some questions about that Signal Gate scandal.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (25:54)

Anybody else should the defense secretary and the vice.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (25:56)

Wait, what country are you from?

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (25:57)

From the U.K. okay.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (25:58)

We don't give a crap about your opinion and your reporting. Why don't you go back to your country? We have a major migrant problem.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (26:05)

Okay. Do you.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (26:05)

Cut.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (26:06)

You should care about your own.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (26:07)

Do you care about American lives being put at risk?

Marjorie Taylor Greene (26:09)

Let me tell you something. Do you care about people from your country? What about all the women that are raped by my.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (26:15)

Do you care about America?

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (26:16)

No.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (26:16)

Do you care. Okay.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (26:17)

Do you care about American lives being put at risk? About service members fighting for your country and your vice president and your defense secretary?

Marjorie Taylor Greene (26:27)

This is an American journalist. Thank you.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (26:29)

I'm an American and I'd like to hear your answer to what she's asked.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (26:32)

I'm not answering her question because I don't care about her network. If you would like to ask, I.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (26:37)

Can answer any concerns whatsoever.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (26:39)

Is that a presidential candidate, Anthony? Had politics changed enough that that's somebody who could be taken seriously?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (26:47)

Yeah, I don't know. I mean, if you, if you look at her now, she does look a little more polished. And those clips of her on, on CNN and other outlets where she's apologizing for that kind of behavior, clearly that sort of thing will come up. And she has a long record that could, that could haunt her if she tries to become more involved in national politics. Although, you know, she might help her with the Republican primaries. I think dispute with Donald Trump actually would be more of a. More of a risk in a Republican primary than picking a fight with a Sky News reporter. But I would say, I think speculation about 2028 and a presidential run is going to probably getting a bit too ahead of ourselves. She may have ambitions, and in fact, there are reports that she does have ambitions in Georgia. Running for governor, for instance. There's a governor's seat that comes up next year running for a U.S. senate seat. And there being a little more moderate, being a little more towards the middle, and even having some disagreements with. With Donald Trump wouldn't necessarily hurt her. First of all, statewide in the general election, but even in the primary, because Governor Kemp, the current governor of Georgia, has had his disagreements with Donald Trump and he's been able to stay popular in that state. It's a purple state, it's one that kind of leans Republican, but Joe Biden won it in 2020. So she seems like maybe on the national level, not greatly, not well positioned quite yet, but. But in Georgia, this might help her, and I think that may be the ball that she's keeping her eye on.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (28:27)

How much does Donald Trump need her as a cheerleader, do we think? Because she has, I mean, she has been very effective, probably reaching parts of the electorate that, you know, even he wouldn't necessarily do. She's a loud voice previously in his favor, now speaking out against him. Is this a moment of big jeopardy for him? I think the greatest danger is in him allowing somebody to disagree with them, and they're not being consequences or punishment, if indeed that's what happens. But just in terms of political advocacy, Anthony, how dangerous is this split for Trump, do you think? Does he need mtg?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (29:05)

Well, I think he needs people like mtg. I don't think he necessarily needs her. And he needs people who are advocates for him in the House of Representatives, people who are advocates for him on Fox News. But there are a lot of people out there who are more than willing to fill any kind of vacuum that Marjorie Taylor Greene has created with this feud. So I think he's going to be able to move on from it fairly easily. And she now has to figure out how much does she need Donald Trump? And we're going to find out. And I will add that she has said she's not running for that governor's race next year, not running for a Senate race, Senate seat that comes up next year. But we'll see what her plans are. And maybe she could change her mind.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (29:50)

In terms of the impact that she has on the sort of social media discourse and her ability to shape that. It's not so much that Donald Trump needs her, but that her being his sort of ultimate enemy is not that useful to him. I don't know how much he actually gets out of her just repeating kind of what he says or taking it a bit further. But I think that her being really, really stuck on certain issues, for example, actually like the Epstein files and really going for it online and really sort of encouraging the other influencers to weigh in and to, you know, being their cue essentially to say, actually we can split with Donald Trump on this. I think that that has been actually a bit of a pain in his side, kind of in the same way that Elon Musk then sort of turning on Trump. They seem to be friends again now, but the same way that that was Actually a bit of a pain in his side in terms of shaping the discourse online. I think that that's his problem really, is to make an enemy of her. And you wonder how he might try and.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (30:44)

Yeah, and we shouldn't rule out the possibility that they will find a way to make up. And before you know it, we'll be talking about, you know, they had the turnaround of Marjorie Taylor Greene and how she's become Trump's greatest cheerleader. Once again, anything is possible. Anthony, you're in Tennessee and you said it was for an election. There's a race going on there.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (31:03)

There is. There's a special election to fill a vacant congressional seat. A Republican held the seat. It's a district that starts around the outskirts of Nashville, the capital, the biggest city in Tennessee, but then stretches all the way north to the Kentucky border, all the way south to the Alabama border. It's a district that is reliably Republican. Green, the congressman who vacated the seat, he won this handily last year. Donald Trump carried this congressional district by 22 points last year in the presidential election. But there's a feeling that the Democrat, Afton Bain may be able to win it, that she's competitive. There's been some polls that show it's a close race that is generating a lot of national interest. And this is the, as I mentioned at the top, this is the only game in town. This is probably the last congressional seat up for a vote. The vote is actually starting now with early voting. December 2nd is the election day. Donald Trump held a telerally for Matt Von Epps, the Republican candidate. And just a couple days ago, Kamala Harris, the former vice president, was here in Nashville holding a door knocking organizing event for Bain. And here she is talking to the crowd with a megaphone.

Kamala Harris (32:19)

You tell people what you want. You don't let anybody tell you who you are. You tell them who you are. And that includes at election time. This election is 14 days from today. Today is Tuesday. It's two weeks from now. And you know, I've been in elected office long enough to know that when people start deciding, who am I going to listen to? And I'm going to speak truth right here. This is real talk. They're going to look at two groups of people. Who's writing the text and who's voting?

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (32:54)

Kamala Harris, is that unusual, do you think, that she's campaigning in this election here?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (33:01)

Yeah, it was a bit of a surprise to see her here in Nashville popping up because one of the things that Afton Bain, the Democrats have been doing is trying to run a campaign focusing on local issues. Her yard signs say, you know, feed children, fix roads, take care of health care and not make this a national election. Because Kamala Harris showing up is going to rile up Republicans as much as it riles up Democrats. In fact, they were talking about this at a Republican event I went to last night or the night before last. They were excited that Kamala Harris was there because that showed the stakes and why it's important for them to get out and vote. And this is shaping up the strategy from the Democrats is focusing on turning out the base, which I guess is the explanation for why she's there. They don't necessarily want to want to try to make this a big turnout election probably isn't going to be. I mean, people are struggling to know that December 2nd is election day. But they want their voters to get out and vote. And if they think they do that, then it could kind of sneak under the radar and be a surprising win for Democrats and one that sends a message nationally.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (34:12)

Now, Anthony, I did want to ask you a little bit more about that Republican event dinner, the dinner you were at because you posted something on our AmericasT Chat, a picture of someone dressed up as Abraham Lincoln. What's going on there?

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (34:26)

That was an Abraham Lincoln impersonator who was the keynote speaker at the Abraham Lincoln dinner in Cumberland County, Tennessee, where I was. It was about a two hour drive east of here from Nashville in Crab Orchard, Tennessee. A lot of big Republican state names were there, but they gave the microphone to this Abraham Lincoln impersonator and he talked a little bit about Abraham Lincoln. This is the 120, 62nd anniversary just yesterday of the Gettysburg Address. So he did a reading of the Gettysburg Address. Here he is with the microphone. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (35:15)

He's not exactly a MAGA icon though, Abraham Lincoln, is he? No.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (35:19)

But Donald Trump likes to talk about him. One because, I mean, there's a big monument to him in Washington, D.C. is still largely revered by most Americans. Also, it's a means, I think for Republicans to say to make inroads in the black votes, say, hey, you know, we're the party of Abraham Lincoln. We're the party that, you know, fought for, fought against slavery and fought to free the slaves. So maybe you should give the Republican Party another look. Although it was kind of ironic, Abraham Lincoln gave that, the impersonator gave that speech at this event. And then one of the speakers later on talked about how her great, great, great grandfather fought for the Confederacy in the Civil War in Tennessee, that he was, he was captured by the Yankees, put in a prison in Ohio and died of starvation there. So, I mean, this is still, this is still Confederate country. And so there's a bit of a conflict between, you know, rallying around Abraham Lincoln and then celebrating the fact that you have Confederate ancestors and the atrocities that the north, the Union, did during the Civil War.

Sarah (BBC Washington Bureau) (36:38)

That's a broad sweep of politics, isn't it, that can embrace Abraham Lincoln and Marjorie Taylor Greene at the same time. But for this edition of AmericasT, we should probably just say bye. Bye.

Mariana (AmericasT Host, London) (36:48)

Bye.

Anthony (AmericasT Host, Nashville) (36:48)

Bye.

Podcast Host (36:52)

Thank you for listening to another episode. It is you, the ameracaster, that makes ameracast the community that it now is. If you like what you've heard, please do subscribe to this podcast on BBC Sounds or wherever you get your podcasts. We always want to hear your feedback as well. We look at every single bit of correspondence that we get. So you can send us an email americast@BBC.co.uk the WhatsApp is 443-301-239480 and you can get involved in the AmericasT Discord server. The link to that is in the description. Till next time, bye.

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