Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) flew to Texas to offer help during the winter storm. Our friends at Twitchy had it, noting that this photo op didn’t go as planned. For starters, the storm is over. Also, it was 65 degrees outside. She’s an easy target. There are things you should definitely call her out on, but I’m not so sure we should concentrate a lot of resources on this one. Highlight how this is a shallow photo op opportunity, which some noted, but no matter how much we might not like it, this is in no way worse optically than what Sen. Ted Cruz did.
AOC is in Houston right now to help us with the winter storm. It’s 65 degrees outside. pic.twitter.com/6PnZRKZuDP
— Kenny Webster ?? (@KenWebsterII) February 20, 2021
AOC = Always On Camera
— Christopher (@crfpeters) February 21, 2021
How’d she get there? ???????????? Doesn’t she know the planet is dying? Jetting around like nothing going on. ?? ??????
— Mark Rooney (@Piper336) February 21, 2021
Everything is a photo op for @aoc and @JacksonLeeTX18 pic.twitter.com/llJdAdWTfz
— Scotty Popsicle ?????????????????? (@HTX_Con) February 21, 2021
Now, did this Cancún trip rise to the level of Watergate? No. It’s not a scandal. There’s a difference between an actual political scandal and an optics trip-up. This is a classic liberal scramble to divert attention away from the $1.9 trillion COVID relief bill that doesn’t appear to have a lot of expenditures that actually help those impacted by this virus. It’s a $1 trillion+ bill. It’s Congress. It’s a bunch of horrible people who haven’t done their jobs for decades. Are we shocked?
Yet, as AOC continues to navigate the waters, she was covering her bases. So, what if this photo op blew up when she has raised money for Texas relief? She raised more than $4 million. Ted was in Cancún and she was here raising money for those impacted by a historic winter storm in a deep red state. That’s how this will play out. Eventually, her mistakes will be fewer and far between, which is when we’ll know the gentlelady from New York will probably mount a presidential run. Keep an eye on her.
You can say that AOC stands for “always-on camera.” I know someone posted that, but this failed photo op is not the fiasco she landed in when she visited an immigration detention center during the Trump administration. Oh, she and other Democrats played up the human rights angle to the extreme. This was in the summer of 2019, and she tweeted this:
I’ll never forget this, because it was the moment I saw with my own eyes that the America I love was becoming a nation that steals refugee children from their parents,& caged them.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) June 25, 2019
More kids died after this. To date, no one has been held accountable.
We need to save these kids. https://t.co/HhdMqc5zML
Before @AOC hit the national stage & was just a fairly unknown House candidate frm NYC,she took time awy frm her campaign & came dwn to #Tornillo to protest the #tentcity housing migrant children.I made these previously unpublished fotos a yr ago today. #elpaso #aoc #onassignment pic.twitter.com/SWyyI1XVt9
— Ivan Pierre Aguirre (@i_p_a_1) June 25, 2019
During her tour of the facility, she also accused Border Patrol officers of telling detained women to drink from toilets. Yet, she didn’t tour the facility. And that tweet above showing her cry because she saw detained children is a lie. It was a mostly empty lot. There was a Getty search done and the photographer, Ivan Pierre Aguirre, released another photo showing no children within eyesight of the fencing.
The Texas visit was a failed photo op, sure. But it’s nowhere near as bad as the border one, though it did rehash that episode so, nicely done, congresswoman.