In a very unintentionally funny meltdown that came just days after President Trump was inaugurated as the United States President on January 20, a meltdown that thus occurred almost a year ago but remains relevant because of the continued migrant problem and the fact that it was one of her funniest freak outs, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortes (D-NY) went absolutely ballistic over moves made to lock up migrants.
As background, AOC was particularly upset about the Laken Riley Act, which passed a few days after her hysteric meltdown on the floor of Congress. The law, named for a young woman killed by an illegal alien near the University of Georgia campus, requires the detention without bond of aliens arrested for, charged with, or who admit to committing certain crimes, such as theft or assaulting a law enforcement officer.
Beginning her wild rant attacking Republicans for moving to lock up violent aliens, AOC said, “Mr. Speaker, I want the American people to know with eyes wide open, what is inside this bill because we stand here just two days after President Trump gave unconditional pardons to violent criminals who attacked our nation’s capital on January 6th, and these are the people who want you to believe, who want us to believe that they’re trying to quote unquote “keep criminals off the streets,” when they are opening the floodgates.”
Continuing she went absolutely ballistic over the idea that illegal aliens would face what amounts to a zero tolerance policy on crime, saying, “I want the American people to know what is in this bill. Because in the guise and in the in the wake of tragedy, we are seeing a fundamental erosion of our civil rights. In this bill, if a person is so much as accused of a crime, if someone wants to point a finger and accuse someone of shoplifting, they will be rounded up and put into a private detention camp and signed and sent out for deportation without a day in court, without a moment to assert their right and without a moment to assert the privilege of innocent until proven guilty without being found guilty of a crime that will be rounded up, that is what is inside this bill, a fundamental suspension of a core American value, and that is why I rise to oppose it.”
Bizarrely, the shouting and yelling representative then angrily went ballistic over the idea that certain illegal aliens could be locked up and tried comparing that to the PATRIOT Act, saying, “If you’re a DREAMer, all someone has to do is point a finger and you will be rounded up. And we have seen moments like these happen before in the Patriot Act in the wake of the travesty of 9/11, a fundamental suspension of American civil liberties. That is what we are seeing here today, Mr. Speaker, you may wonder why so many of our friends across the aisle who care so deeply about the rule of law happen to be so desperate to pass this bill.”
Still not done, she again referenced January 6 as a way of insisting that locking up illegal aliens is bad, snapping, “After they are unleashing people who attacked police officers here on the on this Capitol into roaming our streets who are publicly saying now they want to get a gun, suddenly these folks care about public safety. I don’t think so.”
In yet another odd part of the freakout, she melted down, shouting and yelling, over the idea that billions would be allocated toward defending America from invasion, snapping, “Look no further than the price tag of this bill, $83 billion. They know that it can’t be paid for. They know that the capacity is not there, and you know what will be there?”
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She then pretended that the only reason a Republican legislator would support the move is wanting to profit off of stock trading, saying, “Private prison companies are going to get flooded with money, who give this money no doubt — I want folks at home to look. Look at what members of Congress are invested in private prison companies who receive this kind of money and look at the votes on this bill. It is atrocious that people are are lining their pockets with private prison profits in the name of a horrific tragedy and the victim of a crime. It is shameful. It is absolutely shameful.”
Watch her lose it on the House floor here:
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video