Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (image via Instagram)
Last night, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took to Instagram for a riveting hour and a half live session that detailed exactly what happened during the January 6th Capitol insurrection, from her perspective. It’s a powerful and emotional description of events that *should* transcend politics to reveal the human toll of that day’s violence, but, well, I’m not going to hold my breath.
Before she gets to the harrowing tale of the riot — and really, you should watch it yourself — AOC addresses the critics who suggest she should just “move on”:
“We cannot move on without accountability. We cannot heal without accountability. And so all of these people who want to tell us to move on are doing so at their own convenience.”
In a personal moment, Ocasio-Cortez reveals she’s a survivor of sexual violence and draws analogies to the trauma visited by the insurrection. AOC specifically calls out a pair of Texas lawyers turned lawmakers — Senator Ted Cruz and Representative Chip Roy — for wanting to sweep the insurrection under the rug and even demanding she apologize. Ocasio-Cortez likens this behavior to that of abusers, who seek to move past any violence quickly so they can do it again:
“These are the tactics of abusers. Or rather, these are the tactics that abusers use,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “What they’re asking for when they say, ‘Can we just move on?’ … is, ‘Can you just can we just forget this happened so that I can do it again, without recourse?… Can you just forget about this so that we can, you know, do it again?’”
AOC also mentions the actions of two other lawyer-politicians for their actions in perpetuating the big lie of election fraud and fomenting the violence at the Capitol, Senator Josh Hawley and Representative Mo Brooks. She said she believes all these folks should resign as a result of their actions, and notes that in the weeks since the Capitol violence they’ve had the opportunity to apologize for their actions, but instead they’ve doubled down:
“What that tells me is that when given another window of political opportunity for themselves, even if they know that it means that it will endanger their colleagues, they will do it again.”
“Accountability is not about revenge. It’s not about getting back at people. It’s not about any of that. It’s about creating safety. And we are not safe with people who hold positions of power, who are willing to endanger the lives of others if they think it will score them a political point.”
It might be a mere coincidence that those named-checked by AOC as causing unique harm leading up to and then after the Capitol insurrection are all lawyers. (Lauren Boebert is not named, nor a lawyer or even a high school graduate, while causing plenty of damage.) But it still seems like there is something deeply wrong with our legal education system if it can create so many willing to overlook facts and data for political expediency.
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, and host of The Jabot podcast. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).