U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., on Friday apologized to her constituents for her “present” vote a day earlier on funding Israel’s Iron Dome defense system and explained why she cried on the House floor.
“Yes, I wept,” she wrote in the three-page letter to constituents that she posted on her Twitter. “I wept at the complete lack of care for the human beings that are impacted by these decisions, I wept at an institution choosing a path of maximum volatility and minimum consideration for its own political convenience.”
Ocasio-Cortez was mocked by conservatives for shedding “crocodile tears” over the vote.
Some on social media speculated that the lawmaker wanted “to vote No but was talked out of it for some strategic reason” and many who commented on her letter to constituents said it still didn’t explain the reason she voted ‘present.’
“So many words to say: ‘I believe this bill should have been opposed but I was too cowardly to oppose it,’” one person commented. Another pointed out that the lawmaker once criticized former U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard for her ‘present’ vote on impeachment, saying it’s better to take a stand. “We are sent here to lead,” Ocasio-Cortez said at the time.
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