Marjorie Taylor Greene says Israel-Iran conflict splitting Trump's MAGA base

Tia Mitchell, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Jun 19, 2025

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WASHINGTON — As President Donald Trump considers whether to use America’s military might to help Israel destroy nuclear facilities in Iran, he is facing sharp criticism from some of his closest and highest-profile allies.

Georgia U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has joined other notable MAGA figures, such as former Trump strategist Steve Bannon, conservative commentator Tucker Carlson and former Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, in saying that the U.S. should not get involved in Iran. Doing so, they say, would violate Trump’s commitment to an “America First” foreign policy approach.

“The campaign was ‘America First,’ and it was ‘America First’ unapologetically,” Greene, R-Rome, said during an interview with Gaetz this week on the far-right One American News Network. “And that means something to me, because that’s what people voted for.”

She has focused her criticism on fellow Republicans who she said are giving Trump bad advice as they encourage him to get involved in Israel’s war with Iran.

But the rift is better explained by a shift within the Republican Party from a more traditional brand of conservatism that backs engaging in the affairs of other nations, to the strictly isolationist policies of Greene and other hard-right conservatives who want the U.S. to avoid involving itself in foreign conflicts.

Greene, Bannon, Gaetz and Carlson enjoy large and heavily engaged followings on social media. They have used their platforms in recent days to criticize fellow Republicans who have expressed support for Israel.

But there are plenty of Trump-supporting advisers, conservative activists and members of Congress who are on the other side.

U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” that he has told Trump to use the U.S. military to aid Israel if diplomacy with Iran fails.

“Help Israel finish the job. Give them bombs. Fly with them if necessary,” Graham said. “I cannot stress to you how, if you want to get Russia right, you want to make China be better, you want to convince international terrorism we mean business, you’ve got to finish the job with Iran.”

Besides Greene, virtually every other Republican in Georgia’s congressional delegation shared messages supporting Israel in the days after the news that it had launched strikes in Iran hoping to decimate the country’s nuclear weapons sites.

U.S. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Cassville, wrote on X that Israel had a right to defend itself against Iran.

“Iran’s development of nuclear weapons is a direct threat to Israel and the United States,” Loudermilk wrote. “We must not allow the world’s largest supporter of terrorism to ever have access to nuclear weapons.”

Most Republicans see no political reasons to split with Israel, considered America’s strongest ally, and even those who privately might have reservations would generally avoid any public comments that Trump could interpret as undermining his authority.

Greene has shown an uncanny ability to remain in Trump’s good graces even as she takes occasional positions that could be considered in conflict with his agenda, such her recent statements criticizing the House-passed version of his “big, beautiful” tax and spending bill. Days later, she joined Trump at the White House to celebrate his birthday and view the military parade.

Greene has publicly warned the split isn’t good for Trump or the party. She said the debate has caused a rift among Trump’s base of MAGA voters.

“It’s going to fracture it, and it’s already fracturing it,” she said on OAN.

The issue is likely to play out in the halls of Congress in the coming days. Two competing bills related to this latest conflict have been filed in the U.S. House and are gathering cosponsors from both parties.

Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California and Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky have introduced a war powers resolution in hopes to preventing the U.S. from getting involved at all unless Congress authorizes it.

Massie is an isolationist like Greene. In November 2023, the duo were the only two Republicans to vote against emergency aid for Israel to assist with its war against Hamas.

A competing resolution filed by Reps. Brad Sherman, D-Calif., and Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., would voice congressional support for Israel’s strikes in Iran.

“The U.S.-Israel partnership remains unshakable,” Tenney said in a news release. “And this resolution sends a clear and unified message: we will work together to ensure the Iranian regime is never able to obtain a nuclear weapon.”