On Tuesday evening, Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez issued a series of tweets defending her role in ultimately killing the Amazon HQ2 deal, which would have brought 25,000 jobs to her district and nearly $30 billion in tax revenues to the state, and emphatically asserting that she does “understand” how tax incentives work.
The defensive thread was prompted by criticism from Crain’s New York Business editor Erik Engquist, who said that while he usually defends the democratic socialist congresswoman as intelligent, her troubling comments about the state “invest[ing] those $3 billion” instead of supposedly giving it to Amazon has left him speechless.
I’ve been telling @AOC critics that she is smart, but what do I say when she says nonsense like “we could invest those $3 billion in [@amazon tax breaks] in our district. We could hire more teachers. We can fix our subways, we can put a lot of people to work for that money”
— Erik Engquist (@erik_engquist) February 19, 2019
Not sure how many pundits talking about Amazon even read the deal or where it was going.
$500+ million of the deal was *capital grants.*
$2.5 billion in tax breaks.
It’s fair to ask why we don’t invest the capital for public use, + why we don’t give working people a tax break. https://t.co/jUqaugUHYP
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) February 19, 2019
Frankly, the knee-jerk reaction assuming that I “don’t understand” how tax giveaways to corps work is disappointing.
No, it’s not possible that I could come to a different conclusion. The debate *must* be over my intelligence & understanding, instead of the merits of the deal.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) February 19, 2019
There’s no CHANCE that the speculative insider real-estate buys that were creating immediate spikes in rent in one of the most rent-burdened communities in NYC could have possibly been unpopular?https://t.co/wArbA7B1Q6
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) February 19, 2019
Or that a technology giant of big-brother-esque potential was selling (notoriously flawed & racially biased) facial recognition technology to ICE while trying to move into 1 of the most immigrant-dense areas of the world?
No, it must be because I’m dumb.https://t.co/IoBixav34r
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) February 19, 2019
https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1098013818909790209?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1098013818909790209&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailywire.com%2Fnews%2F43712%2Focasio-cortez-explodes-over-people-saying-she-james-barrett
Among those criticizing the Democratic opposition to the deal is Democratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who slammed “a small group of politicians” who “put their own narrow political interests above their community — which poll after poll showed overwhelmingly supported bringing Amazon to Long Island City — the state’s economic future and the best interests of the people of this state.”- READ MORE