You are reading

Ocasio-Cortez Posts Harrowing Account of Last Week’s Insurrection, Feared She Would Be Killed

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (Instagram @aoc)

Jan. 13, 2021 By Christina Santucci

Congress member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said she feared for her life last Wednesday when a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol and forced her and fellow lawmakers into hiding.

She recounted her experience in an hour-long video posted to Instagram late Tuesday night.

Ocasio-Cortez said that she worried that she would be kidnapped or hurt and was concerned that some of her fellow congress members–some of whom she describes as white supremacists –would disclose where she was hiding during the ordeal.

“I, myself, did not even feel safe going to that extraction point because there were QAnon and white supremacist sympathizers – and frankly white supremacist members of Congress – in that extraction point, who I know and who I have felt would disclose my location and … who would create opportunities for me to be hurt, kidnapped, et cetera,” she said.

Ocasio-Cortez’s account was harrowing.

“I had a pretty traumatizing event happen to me,” she said. “But I can tell you that I had a very close encounter where I thought I was going to die.”

“You have all of those thoughts where at the end of your life, and all of these thoughts came rushing to you, and that’s what happened to a lot of us on Wednesday,” she said.

On January 6, violent demonstrators breached the Capitol building as a joint session of Congress gathered to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s Electoral College win. Lawmakers and their staff were forced to hide, and the proceedings were adjourned for several hours before authorities could remove the intruders from the building.

“I did not know if I was going to make it to the end of that day alive, and not just in a general sense but in a very, very specific sense,” she said.

Federal law enforcement officials are working to determine if some of the rioters intended to capture or kill lawmakers or their staff, the Washington Post reported. Photographs of the mayhem depicted several demonstrators carrying zip ties, which are typically used as restraints.

“It is not an exaggeration to say that many, many members of the House were nearly assassinated,” she said. “We were very lucky that things happened within certain minutes that allowed members to escape the House floor unharmed, but many of us narrowly escaped death.”

Since being elected to represent western Queens and parts of the Bronx, Ocasio-Cortez has used social media frequently to connect with constituents and post videos showing her daily life as a member of Congress. She currently has 8.3 million followers on Instagram.

email the author: news@queenspost.com
No comments yet

Leave a Comment
Reply to this Comment

All comments are subject to moderation before being posted.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Recent News

Hollis man charged with raping 14-year-old told teen, ‘I can help you get work’

New details have emerged in the case of the Hollis man accused luring a 14-year-old boy into his car in St. Albans and then allegedly raping him on the afternoon of Tuesday, July 1.

Virgilio Taveras, 63, of Hillside Avenue, was arrested by detectives from the Queens Special Victims Squad two days later and booked at the 107th Precinct in Fresh Meadows. Taveras was arraigned on the Fourth of July in Queens Criminal Court on a complaint charging him with rape in the second degree, luring a child as an E felony, endangering the welfare of a child and other related crimes.

Deadly Belt Parkway crash claims lives of Springfield Gardens man and Manhattan mother: NYPD

A Springfield Gardens man and a passenger in his car died after they were involved in a multi-vehicle chain-reaction crash on the Belt Parkway near Kennedy Airport on the morning of Saturday, July 5.

Noah Thompson, 24, of 179th Street, was behind the wheel of a white BMW 428i traveling eastbound on the Belt Parkway in Howard Beach at 6:05 a.m. when he failed to navigate the roadway approaching the Nassau Expressway exit.