NOEL KING, HOST:
A believer in the wild and debunked QAnon conspiracy theory has won a Republican congressional primary in Georgia. QAnon claims, among other things, that satanic pedophiles are trying to destroy President Trump. Here's Emma Hurt from member station WABE in Atlanta.
EMMA HURT, BYLINE: Many first got to know Marjorie Taylor Greene when Politico dug up videos she'd posted about members of Congress.
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MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE: But I'm sorry, anyone that is a Muslim, that believes in Sharia law, does not belong in our government. They don't.
HURT: She also called Democratic donor George Soros a Nazi. Soros is Jewish and a Holocaust survivor. Some Republican leaders called her comments appalling and disgusting. Facebook pulled one of Greene's ads where she threatened antifa protesters with a rifle. And all of it only fueled her message.
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GREENE: The fake news media hates me. Big Tech censors me. The D.C. swamp fears me. And George Soros and the Democrats are trying to take me down.
HURT: Greene won Tuesday's primary easily, despite her opponent, John Cowan, presenting himself as a conservative with, quote, "none of the embarrassment." On the campaign trail in Dalton, Ga., before the primary, Cowan said he didn't think Greene represented the district.
JOHN COWAN: We are a district that believes in God. We are not a district that has been portrayed by this other person running that is hateful, spiteful, that makes fun of people that are different from us.
HURT: Greene, he pointed out, isn't even from the area. She self-funded a campaign in a suburban Atlanta district before moving to northwest Georgia in December. Her success is indicative of a shift, says University of Georgia political scientist Charles Bullock. Past candidates in the district, he points out, have been very conservative, but...
CHARLES BULLOCK: They would be within whatever the broad mainstream of the Republican Party is. Marjorie Taylor Greene is somewhere out on the shore, on the bank. You know, she is not in the mainstream.
HURT: Greene is all but guaranteed to win in November in this overwhelmingly Republican district.
For NPR News, I'm Emma Hurt in Atlanta.
(SOUNDBITE OF BOSSK'S "THE REVERIE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
