Video shows Rep. Greene calling Parkland shooting survivor a ‘coward’

A video surfaced Wednesday that shows Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) taunting David Hogg, a survivor of the 2018 mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Fla., on Capitol Hill and calling him a “coward.” 

Fred Guttenberg, a father of a student who was one of the 17 people killed in the shooting, shared the video on Twitter on Wednesday morning. It shows Greene closely tailing Hogg, who was on Capitol Hill advocating for stricter gun laws after the massacre. Greene also posted the video to her YouTube page a year ago and promoted it as confronting Hogg over “his push to lobby lawmakers to trample on our Second Amendment Rights.”

.@mtgreenee, is this you harassing @davidhogg111 weeks after the Parkland shooting, that my daughter was killed in & he was in? Calling him a coward for ignoring your insanity. I will answer all of your questions in person. Get ready to record again.pic.twitter.com/aQjL74x7kh

— Fred Guttenberg (@fred_guttenberg) January 27, 2021

In the video, Greene suggests that Hogg and other survivors of the Parkland shooting who became gun control activists are using children to elicit sympathy for their cause.

“Why are you using kids as a barrier? Do you not know how to defend your stance? Look, I’m an American citizen. I’m a gun owner. I have a concealed carry permit, I carry a gun for protection for myself. And you are using your lobby and the money behind it and the kids to try to take away my Second Amendment rights. You don’t have anything to say for yourself? You can’t defend your stance?” Greene asks Hogg, who ignores her.

“How did you get kids? Why do you use kids? Why kids?” Greene presses Hogg.

“You know, if school zones were protected with security guards with guns, there would be no mass shootings at schools. Do you know that? The best way to stop a bad guy with a gun is with a good guy with a gun. But yet you’re attacking our Second Amendment. And you have nothing to say. No words,” she continues.

Hogg and a group of aides continue walking toward the Capitol and eventually Greene stops following them.

Greene then turns to the camera for a minute-long monologue expressing frustration that Hogg secured meetings with lawmakers and press coverage while she did not. 

“Guess what? I’m a gun owner. I’m an American citizen. And I have nothing. But this guy with his George Soros funding and his major liberal funding has got everything,” Greene says.

“And he’s a coward,” Greene adds. “He can’t say one word because he can’t defend his stance. Because there is no defense for taking away guns. There is no defense for gun confiscation. Zero.”

It’s not clear exactly when the video was taken, though Guttenberg said it was in 2018 and just weeks after the shooting.

Hogg responded to Greene in a series of tweets on Wednesday and said that her actions were “just 1/10 of 1% of the harassment advocates for gun control have to deal with.”

“Everyday we are forced to act and fight through all our trauma to fight for those that can’t because they were killed due to people like you refusing to do your job and protect kids not guns,” Hogg tweeted.

Everyday we are forced to act and fight through all our trauma to fight for those that can’t because they were killed due to people like you refusing to do your job and protect kids not guns.

— David Hogg (He / Him) (@davidhogg111) January 27, 2021

Greene’s office emailed a statement to The Hill that said she understood the need to use guns to protect people in schools from guns because of a 1990 incident at her school in Georgia where a student took hostages. 

“In 11th grade, one of my fellow students took our school hostage with a gun he brought to our “gun-free” school,” the statement said. “I understand that fear firsthand and I will always work to protect our gun rights so that Americans can defend themselves and others against bad people intent to harm or kill them.”

The video is not the first instance of Greene suggesting that a recent mass shooting was staged. 

The liberal advocacy group Media Matters last week found that Greene wrote in a Facebook post in 2018 that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wanted more school shootings to enact stricter gun laws. 

“I am told that Nancy Pelosi tells Hillary Clinton several times a month that ‘we need another school shooting’ in order to persuade the public to want strict gun control,” Greene wrote.

Media Matters also found that Greene agreed with a Facebook commenter in 2018 that “none of the school shootings were real or done by the ones who were supposedly arrested for them,” including the Parkland shooting and the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., that killed 26 people, including 20 6- and 7-year-old children.

Greene is facing additional scrutiny this week after CNN found that she indicated support for executing prominent Democrats in 2018 and 2019 before running for Congress, including Pelosi. 

Greene liked a Facebook comment in 2019 that said “a bullet to the head would be quicker” to remove Pelosi. And in 2018, a commenter asked Greene, “Now do we get to hang them ?? Meaning H & O ???” referring to Hillary Clinton and former President Obama. 

Greene replied, “Stage is being set. Players are being put in place. We must be patient. This must be done perfectly or liberal judges would let them off.” 

Greene did not deny that she liked Facebook posts or replied to comments but claimed other people ran her Facebook page at times.

“Over the years, I’ve had teams of people manage my pages. Many posts have been liked. Many posts have been shared. Some did not represent my views,” Greene said in a statement. 

In response to the CNN report, a spokesperson for House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) told Axios on Tuesday that he plans to have a “conversation” with Greene and called her comments “deeply disturbing.”

This story was updated at 11:22 a.m. Jan. 25.