Last week, social media images of New Yorkers wading through waist-high water to catch trains in a flooded New York City subway left people across the country astonished.
And the images left Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez with some choice words for her Republican colleagues in Washington.
Using a video of a woman struggling through a storm-flooded subway station, AOC laid into GOP legislators who oppose climate change legislation with a damning tweet.
\u201cThe Green New Deal, which is a blueprint to create millions of good jobs rebuilding infrastructure to stem climate change & protect vulnerable communities, is unrealistic.\u201d\n\n\u201cInstead we will do the adult thing, which is take orders from fossil fuel execs &make you swim to work.\u201dhttps://twitter.com/sengianaris/status/1413252782329581568\u00a0\u2026— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) 1625786012
In her tweet, Ocasio-Cortez mocked right-wing politicians.
"The Green New Deal, which is a blueprint to create millions of good jobs rebuilding infrastructure to stem climate change and protect vulnerable communities, is unrealistic."
"Instead we will do the adult thing, which is take orders from fossil fuel execs and make you swim to work."
Subways and streets all over New York City flooded last week amid thunderstorms that dropped an inch and a half of rain in just an hour.
It's safe to assume Ocasio-Cortez is rightly furious about it. She posted another tweet in which she used the city's floods to call out her colleagues--including fellow Democrats, in this case--for their opposition to abolishing the filibuster, one of the key mechanisms GOP politicians use to hobble progressive legislation on all sorts of issues, including climate change.
I\u2019m so glad the filibuster is here to fix this oh waithttps://twitter.com/nyscanner/status/1413241074479517699\u00a0\u2026— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) 1625786646
Using a video clip of a flooded New York expressway, AOC sarcastically tweeted:
"I'm so glad the filibuster is here to fix this oh wait."
Ocasio-Cortez took aim at her colleagues earlier in the week too, as a burst petroleum pipeline in the Gulf of Mexico caused the ocean to catch fire. Ocasio-Cortez appeared to reference New York Times story about the actions of oil and gas giant Exxon Mobil. In the video, a lobbyist openly admitted that the company had spread disinformation about climate change and sought to influence senators to undermine Democratic President Joe Biden's climate policy.
Shout out to all the legislators going out on dinner dates with Exxon lobbyists so they can say a Green New Deal is too expensive https://twitter.com/blkahn/status/1411074599803142146\u00a0\u2026— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) 1625264592
In the tweet, Ocasio-Cortez appeared to reference a recent bombshell New York Timesstory in which an Exxon Mobil lobbyist admitted that the company had spread disinformation about climate change and cajoled U.S. Senators to undermine Democratic President Joe Biden's climate policy.
On Twitter, many people applauded Ocasio-Cortez's call-out of politicians' indifference to the ravages of climate change.
It's insanity that old people who won't be around when climate change is ravaging humanity get to deny swift action on addressing it.— Mike Hidalgo (@Mike Hidalgo) 1625786339
As Matthew puts it:https://twitter.com/lapsu/status/1413260284374966279\u00a0\u2026— Pauline von Hellermann (@Pauline von Hellermann) 1625787089
The green new deal is cheaper than climate collapse.— Mac \ud83c\uddf5\ud83c\uddf8 (@Mac \ud83c\uddf5\ud83c\uddf8) 1625786419
capitalism has 0 built in mechanism to consider anything besides immediate profit. within the logic of capitalism it is more efficient to have workers wade through hip high pools of human feces than to correct for climate change.— ALL CAPS WHEN YOU SPELL THE MAN NAME (@ALL CAPS WHEN YOU SPELL THE MAN NAME) 1625786392
We need to pass President Biden\u2019s bipartisan infrastructure plan NOW.— Republicans against Trumpism (@Republicans against Trumpism) 1625786326
What?! This video is ridiculous!!! This should not be happening in the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA!!!— Carmen (@Carmen) 1625786103
A complete infrastructure overhaul based on the GND\u2014ie conducted w/climate change in mind\u2014wld \n\n-modernize our dangerously anachronistic roads, rails, & bridges\n\n-revitalize the economy, provide good-paying union jobs, &thus restore the middle class\n\nSo why can't we get it done?:pic.twitter.com/LxeXYNA0ij— NotATweeter16 (@NotATweeter16) 1625786204
End fossil fuel subsidies and use the money to fund the Green New Deal. Time to fund legislation that benefits the 90 plus percent of the people who pay their taxes— Nidia (@Nidia) 1625797898
NJ seems to be rolling in/out of the power outages under these same storms. The utility companies are happy to take our money, but neglect our infrastructure. GND and infrastructure are interwoven. Now is the time to invest.https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1413275086728146944\u00a0\u2026— dranoa (@dranoa) 1625787446
Who said "climate change" and "infrastructure" are two different things?https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1413275086728146944\u00a0\u2026— Sam S \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf2 \ud83c\udf0a\ud83c\udf0a\ud83c\udf0a\ud83c\uddf1\ud83c\uddf7 (@Sam S \ud83c\uddfa\ud83c\uddf2 \ud83c\udf0a\ud83c\udf0a\ud83c\udf0a\ud83c\uddf1\ud83c\uddf7) 1625831356
The cloudburst storm that flooded New York last week was among the top 10 highest one-hour rainfall events since 1943. Climate scientists expect rain events like last week's to become increasingly more common as climate change continues to intensify.
