Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez made headlines a couple of weeks ago on Twitter during her trip to Puerto Rico by showing the conditions in which her grandmother is living.
She blamed former president Donald Trump’s policies country for those conditions.
“Just over a week ago, my abuela fell ill. I went to Puerto Rico to see her- my 1st time in a year+ bc of COVID. This is her home,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted.
“Hurricane María relief hasn’t arrived. Trump blocked relief $ for PR. People are being forced to flee ancestral homes, & developers are taking them.”
The tweet had images of a leaking ceiling and buckets all across the floor.
She also said that she reached out to community advocates, pointing out that La Junta, the U.S.-controlled board, had a lot of power.
Many responded to her tweet asking her to take care of the problem herself instead of shifting the blame and asking community organizers for help. One of those speaking out was popular conservative writer and podcast host Matt Walsh.
He pointed out that Ocasio-Cortez makes $174,000 a year as a congresswoman and just leased a Tesla to go along with her two apartments.
AOC responded by accusing Walsh and many others of being complacent with the system that is allowing that to happen.
Instead of getting into a bitter war over social media, Walsh got creative. He made a GoFundMe page to help raise money for AOC’s grandmother, and the result was a staggering $104,000 in just 10 hours.
“One cannot be certain of the cost to repair grandma’s house, but surely most of the work could be completed for the price of AOC’s shiny Tesla Model 3” read the GoFundMe campaign description. “Sadly, virtue-signaling isn’t going to fix abuela’s roof. So we are.”
The Response
Speaking for her grandmother, AOC and her family rejected the funds. Walsh was not pleased with this response.
“This is a problem we could’ve solved not just for abuela but they could’ve taken the money, fix the ceiling, bought her some furniture she clearly needs, and then could’ve taken the rest of the money and helped the neighbors, they could’ve helped the whole community, but they didn’t want to do that,” Walsh said during his show on the Daily Wire and YouTube.
He also raises questions about the actual conditions in her grandmother’s home.
“I think either way it’s sort of scandalous on AOC’s part,” Walsh told Tucker Carlson on Fox News. Walsh said that he personally chipped in with $499, which just happens to be the exact amount of a monthly Tesla lease payment.
GoFundMe has refunded everyone who donated to the cause. Some popular conservative pundits who contributed were Candance Owens and Ben Shapiro.
