A few weeks ago, Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez made one of her many waves when she tweeted about the complete absence of affordable housing in Washington, D.C., and how that put her, a newly elected congresswoman, in a financial bind. Very quickly, right-wingers and other intellectually vacuous supposed bootstrappers, attempted to shame Ocasio-Cortez for not already enjoying a six-figure salary or a family history that includes being floated by one’s parents. That backfired. But Ocasio-Cortez’s point at the time was not simply to gripe about housing costs in our nation’s capital, but to point out that income inequality in our country has led to unlivable conditions.
It is unjust for Congress to budget a living wage for ourselves, yet rely on unpaid interns & underpaid overworked staff just bc Republicans want to make a statement about “fiscal responsibility.”
If that’s the case, they can cut down on staff to pay them well. Or raise the MRA.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Ocasio2018) December 3, 2018
Conservatives came out of their QAnon hovels in order to tell off Rep. Ocasio-Cortez. Bloomberg reporter Steven Dennis stepped up to make another simple point.
Lawmakers still seeking unpaid interns in 2018.
Apartmentsdotcom lists zero apartments under $1,000 a month on Capitol Hill.
Zero.
That seriously limits who can afford to take an internship.— Steven Dennis (@StevenTDennis) December 3, 2018
Yes. That does limit people.
Gotta love the rich irony of Congressmen asking “How are you going to pay for it?” suddenly grow awfully quiet when called out on their expectation that part-time workers magically invent money to work for free https://t.co/303cx5DpvA
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Ocasio2018) December 3, 2018
Crickets.
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