'Became the swamp king': MTG accuses Trump of protecting the establishment he vowed to destroy

Former Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene launched a scathing attack on President Donald Trump, accusing him of becoming the very thing he vowed to destroy during his 2024 reelection campaign. "Instead, he built a fortress around it, protected it, and fully became king of the swamp," she wrote, posting her rebuke shortly after Senator Lindsey Graham claimed victory in his South Carolina primary on Tuesday.

Greene was caustic in her assessment of Graham, flagging his F-rated conservative voting scorecard and hawkish foreign policy record, comparing his appetite for war to that of Mark Levin, known for his support for American military intervention. "This is repulsive," she averred. The 52-year-old has grown increasingly critical of Donald Trump since the President distanced himself from her after she became one of four Republicans to force a vote on the Epstein Files Transparency Act.

The broadside is yet another instance of how one of Trump's most loyal former allies has turned on him, raising questions about fractures within the Make America Great Again movement as the midterms approach in November. It also offered a glimpse into how conservatives like Greene perceived Trump since his return to the White House, casting doubt on whether his second term fulfills the promises of his 2024 reelection bid or is a quiet accommodation of the very establishment forces he vowed to dismantle on the campaign trail.

This is not the first time Greene has censured Trump since leaving Congress in January. She previously warned of a civil war brewing inside the Republican Party after Rep. Thomas Massie was defeated in the Kentucky primary by Trump-backed former Navy SEAL Ed Gallatin. Massie was among the same four Republicans who forced the Epstein files vote. Greene alleged that both she and Massie paid a political price for crossing the President, even when doing so meant holding him to his own campaign promises.

Meanwhile, Graham—now into his fourth Senate term—fended off multiple primary challengers, with his stiffest competition coming from businessman Mark Lynch, who poured millions into the race, according to NBC News. Trump threw his support behind Graham in April, declaring he was the man to get the job done. The President had supported Graham in 2020 as well.

The endorsement was a far cry from their earlier dynamic. Graham was once among Trump's most vocal Republican critics, having called him a "demagogue" and "the world's biggest jackass," as per The New York Times. This changed after Trump was elected president in 2016, with Graham telling CBS News he was compelled to abide by the decision of the American people who "rejected his analysis" of Trump, the report added.