Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez is being nicknamed “Alexandria Ocasio-Smollett” as details emerge that she exaggerated the extent of her “trauma” from the Capitol rebellion, given that she was not at the siege site, but in a nearby office building .
In the four weeks since the riot, Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has repeatedly said he feared for his life on January 6, as a result of a “very close encounter”.
This week, the Progressive Police shared more details of that meeting during an Instagram Live.
Ocasio-Cortez was in his office when protesters stormed the Capitol, which is located in the Cannon building. The building is part of the general Capitol complex, but is not within the Capitol building itself.
She remained barricaded in her office for hours when a man who turned out to be a Capitol Police officer rushed to her office to direct her to a safer place for lawmakers.
The officer, said AOC, had “anger and hostility in his eyes”, making her question whether he was trying to put her in a “vulnerable situation”. Still, she chose to trust him and not “judge”.
The 31-year-old legislator was then thrilled to reveal that she was a sexual assault survivor, which made her “fight the idea of being believed”.
She gave no details about the attack or when it occurred.
This struggle, she said, prevented her from initially talking about her experience at the Capitol.
After sharing her story, Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) Revealed that during the rebellion, Ocasio-Cortez entered his office, did not stop to speak to her and began to open the closet doors.
“I was like, ‘Can I help you?’ Like, ‘What are you looking for?’ ”, Porter shared during an appearance on MSNBC.
“‘I’m looking for where I’m going to hide,'” said Ocasio-Cortez.
Porter said he tried to calm AOC by saying that she was a mother and had plenty of supplies in the office to support them.
“She said, ‘I just hope to be a mother. I hope I don’t die today, ”said Porter, who works alongside Ocasio-Cortez in the Longworth office building.
The problem with its history, however, is that the troublemakers did not invade the building in question, confirmed by Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC), who tweeted: “My office is 2 doors down. The rebels never invaded our corridor. “
The accusation began to circulate on social media, resulting in the Democratic Socialist being dragged to various platforms, including his favorite: Twitter.
After being called by conservative journalist Jack Posobiec on the platform with a map of the Capitol complex, the New York lawmaker responded.
“This is not a fact check. Your arrows are not accurate. They lie about where the crowd attacked and put them further than they were, ” she tweeted Wednesday afternoon, “You were also unable to transmit * several * areas that people were trying to invade. It was not 1. You were also unable to show the tunnels. Bad work everywhere. “
Posobiec’s map highlighted the 0.3-mile distance between the Democratic lawmaker’s office building and the Capitol Rotunda.
After being called by Ocasio-Cortez, Posobiec stood beside the map, sharing it again and writing: “Maps cut rhetoric”.
Posobiec went on to call the AOC for continuing to defend his story, writing in a series of tweets, including one in which he took a screenshot of a post by the legislator about how the protests should make people uncomfortable.
“Is that you?” he asked next to the screenshot of the AOC tweet saying, “The purpose of protesting is to make people uncomfortable. Activists take on this discomfort with the status quo and advocate concrete policy changes. Popular support usually starts small and grows. For people who complain, protest demands make others uncomfortable … that’s the point. “
Fox News presenter Tucker Carlson also criticized the two-term legislator, saying on his primetime show on Wednesday: “There were no protesters in the Sandy Cortez corridor. Trump voters were not trying to kill her, nor were other US senators. “
“Many of the protesters were more irritated by [then-Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell than any Democrat. To some extent, what you saw on January 6 was an intra-party struggle. Not everything, but a little. An act of meaningless destruction aimed at Republican leaders born out of long-standing frustration.
“The people who run the Republican Party don’t care about the people who elect them. This has been true for a long time, ”said Carlson, adding that Republican leaders were“ probably in more serious danger ”than Democrats during the siege.
Speaking of accusations that she was exaggerating or lying about her experience, Ocasio-Cortez issued several tweets to defend herself.
“You may not know that you know a survivor, but it is highly likely that you do. Trauma survivors are close to you. They are people you love and may not know. Many decide whether their story is safe with someone by the way they respond to other survivors. Don’t push them away, ” she wrote in one of several posts.
“The sad thing about disinformation is that, once the truth is revealed, the damage is already done. People have already been deceived, radicalized and believe in lies to the point that their hatred has turned to violence, ”she wrote. in another.
“That was what led to the 6th, and it is happening now.”
“Like when you cheated people all week, for example,” replied Posobiec in another tweet.
After the interaction with Posobiec, the hashtags #AOClied and #AlexandriaOcasioSmollett jumped to the main trends in the United States, an apparent comparison with actor Jussie Smollett, who falsely claimed to have been a victim of a hate crime.
In an email later sent to supporters, she encouraged them to “identify and post who are threatening or harassing and use the integrated reporting features to flag them for moderators.”
Facebook and Twitter have built-in tools to report posts and tweets that violate the rules, ”said his email.
After the email was revealed, Posobiec returned to the social media platform to call the legislator to censor the hashtags.
“To be clear, a US government official is calling on technology companies to censor private citizens for daring to point out when it is not telling the truth,” he wrote.
Unfortunately for Ocasio-Cortez, tweets seem to keep coming, with #AOClied and #AOCSmollett continuing the trend on the social media platform until Thursday morning.