Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene suggested that Democrats who move to red states should get a ‘cooling off period’ before being allowed to vote

• Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said Democrats moving to red states should be temporarily barred from voting.
• Florida and Texas have received by far the largest influx of new residents relocating from other states.   
• Greene also once again discussed a “national divorce,” where blue and red states split.

On Wednesday, Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene advocated that people moving from Democratic-leaning states to Republican-leaning states should be temporarily barred from voting.

The congresswoman tweeted that “brainwashed people” moving from California and New York “really need a cooling off period.”

—Marjorie Taylor Greene 🇺🇸 (@mtgreenee) December 29, 2021

“After Democrat voters and big donors ruin a state like California, you would think it wise to stop them from doing it to another great state like Florida,” she wrote in a retweet of a thread by a Twitter user who criticized Democrats seeking to move to red states.

The user suggested “actively discriminating against transplants like this through legislation” and should “pay a tax for their sins.” 

—Pedro L. Gonzalez (@emeriticus) December 29, 2021

Florida and Texas received the highest number of new residents relocating from inside the US between July 2020 and July 2021, according to the latest Census data. Florida’s population rose by 220,890 people due to domestic migration, while Texas’s population jumped by 170,307 people during the 12-month period. 

In the same time frame, 367,299 people moved away from California, and 352,185 migrated from New York, the highest out of any state in the US. Illinois came in at a distant third place, with 122,460 people moving away.

In her tweet, Greene said the Twitter user’s suggestions would all be “possible” in the event of a “national divorce”  between Democratic and Republican states.

In October, Green conducted a controversial Twitter poll asking her followers if they wanted to split red and blue states. A close majority — 47.7% — of 84,487 responses on social media supported staying together. Another 9% said they were undecided. 

But Greene later said on a podcast with Steve Bannon that the 43% who voted to split the US served as a “wake-up call” to Democrats and showed how “irreconcilable” the nation’s divisions have become.

Rep. Greene’s media office did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.