The Latest: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, former Trump loyalist, says she will resign from Congress

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, a once-loyal supporter of President Donald Trump who has become a critic, said Friday that she is resigning from Congress in January.

In a more than 10-minute video posted online, Greene explained her decision and said she has “always been despised in Washington, D.C., and just never fit in.”

Greene’s announcement follows a public fallout with Trump in recent months, as the congresswoman criticized him for his stance on files related to Jeffrey Epstein, along with foreign policy and health care.

Trump branded her a “traitor” and “wacky” and said he would endorse a primary challenge against her next year.

Greene said her last day will be Jan. 5.

Here's the latest:

The president told ABC News in a brief phone call Friday night that he has no plans to speak with Greene but wishes her well.

The widow of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi is calling for the release of the transcript of a 2019 phone call between the president and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Hanan Elatr Khashoggi is joining Democratic lawmakers who are raising questions about what, if anything, Trump may have received in exchange for his embrace of the crown prince.

She appeared on Capitol Hill on Friday morning on the heels of Trump’s dismissal of U.S. intelligence findings that Prince Mohammed most likely had some culpability in the October 2018 killing.

Trump also lavished the Saudi ruler this week with some of Washington’s highest honors for a foreign dignitary, deepening the business and military relationship between the two nations.

▶ Read more about calls for the transcript’s release and the White House’s response

The Coast Guard released a new, firmer policy late Thursday addressing the display of such symbols, hours after it was revealed that an emerging policy would have loosened the language to describe them only as “potentially divisive.”

Sen. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., and Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., who lead a bipartisan antisemitism task force, sent a letter Friday to Adm. Kevin Lunday, the acting commandant of the Coast Guard.

Rosen and Lankford, who said they spoke to Lunday on Thursday, called the new policy a “step in the right direction to affirm the Coast Guard’s commitment to maintaining a safe and inclusive environment for all its members.”

However the senators indicated they still had questions about how commanding officers or supervisors would look into such incidents under the new policy. Specifically they asked Lunday about why his memo called for supervisors to “inquire” rather than conduct an investigation, as had previously been the course of action.

Josh McKoon called her “a tireless fighter for America First principles, conservative values, and holding the establishment accountable — qualities that helped deliver victories for Republicans.”

Posting on social media, McKoon called Greene’s decision to step down “a surprise amid recent challenges” and said the party would “work diligently to ensure a conservative warrior” is elected in her heavily Republican district.

The conservative influencer said Greene’s departure from Congress will reduce the GOP’s already-slim House majority and hamper Trump’s agenda ahead of the 2026 midterms.

“She wants the Democrats to win,” Loomer said on the social platform X.

That was when she announced she would not run for Senate against Democratic incumbent Jon Ossoff, while attacking GOP donors and consultants who feared she could not win. When Trump disowned her in a social media post Nov. 14, he said he sent Greene a poll showing that she “didn’t have a chance.”

Greene’s restlessness only intensified in July, when she announced that she would not run for governor, either. She argued that a political “good ole boy” system was endangering Republican control of the state.

“I have too much self respect and dignity, love my family way too much, and do not want my sweet district to have to endure a hurtful and hateful primary against me by the president we all fought for,” Greene said.

Republicans will likely lose the midterms, she added, and then she would “be expected to defend the president against impeachment after he hatefully dumped tens of millions of dollars against me and tried to destroy me.”

“It’s all so absurd and completely unserious,” Greene said. “I refuse to be a battered wife hoping it all goes away and gets better.”

The president said Friday night via social media that he was “immediately” terminating Temporary Protective Status program for them in the state. He suggested, without providing details, that the state is “a hub of fraudulent money laundering activity.”

Trump previously moved to end similar legal protections for around 430,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. This week a federal court also halted the administration’s efforts to block TPS for Syrians, part of Trump’s larger crackdown on immigration.

Minnesota is home to a large Somali community.

Since January, she said, her bills “just sit collecting dust.” She complained that Speaker Mike Johnson kept the House out of session during the government shutdown.

“That’s how it is for most members of Congress’ bills,” Greene said. “The speaker never brings them to the floor for a vote.”

The opening means Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp will have to set a special election date within 10 days of Greene’s resignation.

It would include party primaries and a general election to fill out the remainder of her term through January 2027.

Those votes could take place before the party primaries in May for the next two-year term.

As she embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory and appeared with white supremacists, the Republican congresswoman was opposed by party leaders but welcomed by the president. He called her “a real WINNER!”

Greene, in her video, underscored her longtime loyalty to Trump except on a few issues and said it was “unfair and wrong” that he attacked her for disagreeing.

“Loyalty should be a two-way street, and we should be able to vote our conscience and represent our district’s interest, because our job title is literally ‘representative,’” she said.

Greene swept to office at the forefront of the MAGA movement and swiftly became a lightning rod on Capitol Hill for her often beyond mainstream views.

Yet over time she proved a deft legislator, having aligned herself with then-GOP leader Kevin McCarthy, who would go on to become House speaker. She was a trusted voice on the right flank until he was ousted in 2023.

Greene, who fell out with Trump in a public feud, said Friday that she is resigning in January.

The Republican congresswoman has criticized the president’s foreign policy focus and his reluctance to release more documents related to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Trump responded by supporting a primary challenge against her and called her “Wacky” Marjorie.

▶ Read more about Greene resigning in January

The high court temporarily blocked the lower-court court ruling, which held that the state’s 2026 congressional redistricting plan likely discriminates on the basis of race.

The order signed by Justice Samuel Alito will remain in place at least for the next few days while the court considers whether to allow the new map favorable to Republicans to be used in the midterm elections.

The court’s conservative majority has blocked similar lower court rulings because they have come too close to elections.

Alito handles emergency appeals from Texas.

The U.S. Coast Guard has released a new, firmer policy addressing the display of hate symbols like swastikas and nooses just hours after it was publicly revealed that it made plans to describe them as “potentially divisive” — a term that prompted outcry from lawmakers and advocates.

“Divisive or hate symbols and flags are prohibited,” the latest Coast Guard policy, released late Thursday, declared before adding that this category included “a noose, a swastika, and any symbols or flags co-opted or adopted by hate-based groups.”

“This is not an updated policy but a new policy to combat any misinformation and double down that the U.S. Coast Guard forbids these symbols,” an accompanying Coast Guard statement said.

The late-night change came the same day that media outlets, led by The Washington Post, discovered that the Coast Guard had written a policy earlier this month that called those same symbols “potentially divisive.”

“We want to exclude more products and move forward in the negotiation,” Vice President Geraldo Alckmin told journalists in Brasilia. Alckmin, who also serves as Trade minister, led the negotiations with the U.S. along with Brazilian diplomats and business leaders.

Cecafé, Brazil’s coffee exporters council, also celebrated Trump’s order and called the tariff hike “a complete loss of competitiveness.”

“The tariff reversal comes after months of intense work representing the interests of Brazilian coffee. It is a historic victory for the entire coffee agribusiness production chain,” the council said in a statement.

Brazil has long been a key supplier of beef and coffee to the United States. On Thursday, Trump lifted tariffs on Brazilian goods as part of an effort to lower consumer costs. The decision affected coffee, fruit and beef, among other products.

The health secretary, a longtime vaccine critic, told The New York Times that he personally directed the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to update its website to contradict its longtime guidance that vaccines don’t cause autism.

The CDC’s “vaccine safety” page now claims that the statement “vaccines do not cause autism” is not based on evidence because it doesn’t rule out the possibility that infant vaccines are linked to the disorder. The page also was updated to suggest that health officials have ignored studies showing a potential link.

Public health researchers and advocates strongly rebutted the updated website, saying it misleads the public by exploiting the fact that the scientific method cannot satisfy a demand to prove a negative. They noted that scientists have thoroughly explored potential links between vaccines and autism in rigorous research spanning decades, all pointing to the same conclusion that vaccines don’t cause autism.

▶ Read more about RFK Jr. and the website change

The state is asking the Supreme Court for an emergency order to be allowed to use a congressional redistricting plan favorable to Republicans in the 2026 elections despite a lower-court ruling saying the map likely discriminates on the basis of race.

Texas called on the high court Friday to intervene to avoid confusion as congressional primary elections approach in March. The justices have blocked past lower-court rulings in congressional redistricting cases, most recently in Alabama and Louisiana, that came several months before elections.

Texas redrew its congressional map in the summer as part of President Trump’s efforts to preserve a slim Republican majority in the House next year, touching off a nationwide redistricting battle.

“This deal will not create a just and lasting peace,” Democratic Sens. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, Mark Warner of Virginia, Patty Murray of Washington, Chris Coons of Delaware, Brian Schatz of Hawaii and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said in a statement.

“It will leave Ukraine vulnerable, Europe unstable, and America weaker.”

The lawmakers added that Trump must work with Congress alongside partners in Ukraine and NATO allies “to find a lasting solution that will make Americans and the world safer.”

“Let us be clear: this is a war of Russian aggression, led by a dictator who has commanded his troops to commit war crimes, steal children from their families, and torture civilians,” the senators said.

“President Trump is rewarding President Putin for these crimes while cutting out the Ukrainians who have fought and died for the cause of democracy and our European allies who have stepped up to support them.”

The two had called each other “fascist” and “communist,” but when the president and New York Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani faced reporters in the Oval Office on Friday, they were just two iconoclastic New York politicians who were all smiles.

The much-anticipated face-to-face showed how the politicians’ shared love of the city — and no doubt some political calculus — could paper over months of insults. Both men used a plainspoken, wry approach tailor-made for the age of social media to make their points, and each left the meeting with something he needed.

▶ Read more about takeaways from the encounter

“Putin has spent the entire year trying to play President Trump for a fool,” the former GOP leader said in a statement.

“If administration officials are more concerned with appeasing Putin than securing real peace, then the president ought to find new advisors,” he added.

“Rewarding Russian butchery would be disastrous to America’s interests.”

The agency said to “exercise caution” in the country’s airspace “due to the worsening security situation and heightened military activity.”

The message said unspecified threats “could pose a potential risk to aircraft at all altitudes” as well as planes taking off and landing in the country and even aircraft on the ground.

The warning comes as Washington ramps up pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. The U.S. has conducted bomber flights up to the Venezuelan coast and sent an aircraft carrier to the region.

A former inspector general for the Department of Transportation said the FAA puts out this kind of notice anytime there is a military conflict.

“I wouldn’t take it as necessarily there’s any kind of attack is imminent, because I’ve seen these issued many times before. But as a pilot myself, I’d certainly heed it,” Mary Schiavo said.

Schiavo said the U.S. may be anticipating Venezuelan military action or it could be planning additional action against drug boats, and it’s hard to read into this notice and know what is behind it.

The big loser in the meeting between Trump and New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani might be Consolidated Edison Inc., the New York City energy and utility company.

ConEd stock fell from $102.28, when the two began taking reporters’ questions, to close at $100.16. That was a 2% drop in roughly 15 minutes.

What spooked investors? Probably what Trump said.

“Remember, we talked about Con Edison,” the president said. “We’ve gotten fuel prices way down, but it hasn’t shown up in Con Edison. And we’re going to have to talk to them.”

Trump said ConEd has to lower its rates.

“Absolutely,” Mamdani said.

The Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced Friday that it will spend those funds on data testing the effects of innovative mental and behavioral health interventions.

The new initiative, Evidence-Based Validation & Innovation for Rapid Therapeutics in Behavioral Health, or EVIDENT, aims to use data to better predict which treatments will work best for individuals, the agency said.

“With robust data and novel therapies, we are paving the way for understanding the best uses of groundbreaking treatments and demystifying the field of mental health,” said Alicia Jackson, director of ARPA-H.

North Carolina Democratic Gov. Josh Stein wants more answers from the Department of Homeland Security about the crackdown based in Charlotte over the past week that the department said has resulted in hundreds of arrests.

Stein wrote Secretary Kristi Noem on Friday criticizing what he called the “lack of transparency from federal officials regarding the actions and plans” of U.S. Customs and Border Protection since the effort began roughly a week ago.

The governor provided a dozen questions for Noem, including how long “Operation Charlotte’s Web” was expected to last. Local law enforcement in Charlotte said Thursday the operation appeared to be over, but a Homeland Security spokesperson said later that it would not end anytime soon.

Stein also wanted a list of all people arrested and or detained, including why they were picked up and any criminal histories they may have.

DHS didn’t immediately respond to an email Friday seeking a response.

Following his Oval Office meeting with Trump, Mamdani had been headed to talk to reporters in the park across the street from the White House.

But an official with his team told those gathered that the space was “not secure enough,” and canceled the gaggle.

It had been a scrum being organized on the fly, as teams of journalists hurried from the White House driveway space where many visitors speak with reporters after their meetings inside.

Curious onlookers had also clung around the fringes, hoping for a glimpse of the mayor-elect. As there are many days outside the White House, there were also several people — one in a hot pink, inflatable amphibious costume — waving signs bearing messages about a variety of unrelated issues including immigration enforcement and vaccination.

As much of New York’s political class was glued to Mamdani and Trump, the city’s outgoing mayor, Eric Adams, had his focus on another matter: improving trade relations with the nation of Uzbekistan, where he is currently in the middle of a five-day trip.

At around 2 p.m. on Friday (1 a.m. Uzbek time), Adams shared a photo of himself beside the country’s trade minister in Tashkent. That visit is just the latest overseas trip for Adams, who spent four days in Israel last week and traveled to Albania last month. Adams says he is promoting economic and cultural ties.

His critics say he is shirking his mayoral responsibilities while taking advantage of taxpayer-funded globe-trotting. A self-described travel lover, Adams was indicted last year on corruption charges that included allegations he accepted flight upgrades from foreign interests. Those charges were ordered dismissed by Trump’s Justice Department.