AOC decimates GOP colleagues with history lesson on confederacy and treason

Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez handed out a history lesson to members of the GOP and reminded them of their oath in a video on Twitter. Ocasio-Cortez spit fire and facts as she slammed some Republicans for providing legitimacy to White supremacists. Many members of the GOP including the President, incited violence that led a MAGA mob to storm Capitol Hill last Wednesday. Several members of the pro-Trump mob could be seen carrying the flag of the Confederacy. While the media focus has been on the lapses in security and the complicity of the Republicans, AOC pointed out why carrying the Confederate flag into the Capitol was so chilling.

She pointed out that it was the first time the Confederacy flag had ever been flown on Capitol Hill. "When these rioters broke into our nation's Capitol, they flew the confederate flag. Inside our nation's Capitol. Let me break down the historical significance of that. They flew the confederate flag for the first time in American history in the US Capitol. It didn't even make it in during the civil war and there were members cheering them on. Don't get it twisted. There were members who were supportive. You had a member of Congress from Colorado say, 'My people are outside,'" she said. 

"So let me tell you something. Let me share this with every member of Congress who voted to overturn a free and fair election. If any member of Congress so much as stutters to say that the Confederacy were traitors to the United States, that the confederacy is a legion of White supremacists. If you stutter to say that, turn your pin in and get out. Go join them. Why don't you go join them if you're so sympathetic to them. You have no place in the Capitol of the United States of America in the citadel of America if that's the trash that you believe in," she concluded.

The Confederacy was a government of 11 Southern states that seceded from the Union in 1860–61 for refusing to comply with the government's call to end slavery. The Confederacy committed treason to form a separate government within the Union. The Law of Treason notes that "States have no power to form a Confederacy within the Union composed of any of its States," according to The New York Times. Representative Ocasio-Cortez was right when she pointed out that the confederacy were traitors. She also added that "the tragedy of White supremacy is that it's doomed to fail."

Several Republicans are under scrutiny for their role in inciting the riots that led to the death of five people including that of a policeman. Josh Hawley, Ted Cruz, and Lauren Boebert are the ones being pressured to resign, along with Donald Trump, in the wake of riots. All four gave inflammatory speeches or statements leading up to the riots. It will be investigated if they violated the 14th Amendment, which prohibits anyone from holding federal office who has “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.” Lauren Boebert had live-tweeted the attack and wrote that the House Speaker had been evacuated from the chamber, raising eyebrows if she was giving away crucial information that rioters were looking for. 

AOC said she was afraid if "QAnon and white-supremacist sympathizers" in Congress would give away information that would cause harm to her or her Democratic colleagues. “I had a pretty traumatizing event happen to me, and I don’t even know if I can disclose the full details of that event due to security concerns, but I can tell you 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, these thoughts come rushing to you,” said AOC, reported Yahoo News. She was worried after she was instructed to shelter with other members of Congress. She admitted that “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 would create opportunities to allow me to be hurt, kidnapped, et cetera.”