Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is countering Republican criticism that the recent Democratic National Convention ignored riots and lawlessness in American cities.
The Trump administration is “criminal” itself, said the first-term Democratic House member from New York.
“I think that this idea of Republicans as some law-and-order party has gone out the window a long time ago. This is a criminal administration. We just had the sixth or seventh top Trump campaign official getting arrested,” Ocasio-Cortez told the Washington Examiner on Saturday, referencing the arrest of former senior White House adviser Stephen Bannon on fraud charges.
“I think this idea of them trying to claim this mantle of law and order is just pageantry, and it’s feeder, and I don’t think that we benefit ourselves by feeding into this mythology that we have spun for personal gain,” she said. “And so, my take on this is to continue to focus on the solutions that will help and the destabilizing conditions that have been created in the first place.”
The Republican convention launched Monday and includes in its speaking lineup Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the St. Louis, Missouri, residents who were seen with their firearms on their front lawn as Black Lives Matters protesters broke through the gates of their property and marched by their Central West End home in late June.
Additionally, the widow of retired St. Louis Police Capt. David Dorn, Ann Dorn, will be a guest speaker at the convention Thursday. Dorn was a retired captain who was killed by looters who broke into a pawn and jewelry shop during the St. Louis riots following the death of George Floyd, a black man who died while a law enforcement officer in Minneapolis used a knee on Floyd’s neck to restrain him.
