Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) mentioned Monday that it “sure seemed” as if Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) violated the regulation when she hosted a webinar to tell immigrants of their rights in potential confrontations with deportation brokers.
“We’re supposed to uphold the Constitution, not tell people how, you know, to evade the Constitution,” Scott mentioned concerning the congresswoman, in an interview on “The Benny Show” podcast.
The senator added that he didn’t suppose it was “part of my job description to tell people that ‘Here’s how you don’t comply with the law.’”
“So, I think, it sure seemed like she’s violating the law,” Scott mentioned.
Scott mentioned President Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, ought to prosecute Ocasio-Cortez “if she’s done something wrong.”
“Look, we need to have equal protection and equal enforcement of the law,” Scott mentioned. “And if she’s done something wrong, I hope Tom Homan does his job and, you know, prosecutes her to the full extent of the law.”
In a sequence of reports interviews final month, Homan recommended Ocasio-Cortez had violated federal legal guidelines by internet hosting the Feb. 12 “Know Your Rights” seminar, which she’s characterised as providing “practical guidance on how to interact with” deportation officers.
A day after the occasion, he mentioned Ocasio-Cortez is perhaps “impeding” the federal government’s efforts to implement immigration legal guidelines and mentioned, “Maybe AOC is going to be in trouble now,” utilizing the congresswoman’s initials. Homan additionally mentioned he’d despatched an e mail to the deputy lawyer basic asking him to look at the episode.
Ocasio-Cortez has fiercely defended her actions, saying they have been effectively inside her First Modification rights to free speech — a degree she emphasised in a extremely uncommon letter to Lawyer Basic Pam Bondi final week asking if she was in authorized scorching water.
Within the letter, the congresswoman defended her actions however mentioned she was in search of “clarity on whether the Department of Justice (DOJ) has yielded to political pressure and attempts to weaponize the agency against elected officials whose speech they disagree with.”
“It has been 14 days since Mr. Homan first threatened to weaponize your agency, but I have not yet heard any referral from the federal government,” she wrote. “Homan’s actions undercut core Constitutional rights and further transparency is necessary.”
