New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, posted a tweet Thursday calling conservative Democrats “New Southern Democrats” because they “seem hell bent to do to black and brown people today what the old Southern Democrats did in the 40s.”
“Instead of ‘fiscally conservative but social liberal,'” Chakrabarti tweeted, “let’s call the New Democrats and Blue Dog Caucus the ‘New Southern Democrats.’ They certainly seem hell bent to do to black and brown people today what the old Southern Democrats did in the 40s.”
The tweet was deleted soon after, but the image was captured and posted by National Republican Senatorial Committee senior advisor Matt Whitlock, who later posted that the tweet shows “that the member sets the tone for the office and the staff follows.”
Whoa. @AOC’s chief just deleted this. pic.twitter.com/xRJphPAkwb
— Matt Whitlock (@mattdizwhitlock) June 27, 2019
It goes to show that the member sets the tone for the office and the staff follows.
— Matt Whitlock (@mattdizwhitlock) June 27, 2019
Whitlock then noticed that Chakrabarti decided to “double down” on the concept while still deleting the tweet.
Nothing like the ol’ delete then double down.
“Some progressives saw it as a personal insult that I called a huge section of our caucus racist because they wanted to send aid to the border.” pic.twitter.com/LlNzUHuxhQ
— Matt Whitlock (@mattdizwhitlock) June 27, 2019
And I replaced it with the same point stated differently.
— Saikat Chakrabarti (@saikatc) June 27, 2019
Chakrabarti issued a replacement tweet, which was also retweeted by his boss, Rep. Ocasio-Cortez.
“Can we stop calling the Blue Dog Caucus ‘fiscally conservative but socially liberal?'” he wrote. “I missed the part of fiscal conservativeness or social liberalness that includes wasting $4.5 billion of taxpayer money to put kids in concentration camps.” (RELATED: Ocasio-Cortez Gives Illegal Immigrants Advice On Evading Federal Law Enforcement)
Can we stop calling the Blue Dog Caucus “fiscally conservative but socially liberal?” I missed the part of fiscal conservativeness or social liberalness that includes wasting $4.5 billion of taxpayer money to put kids in concentration camps.
— Saikat Chakrabarti (@saikatc) June 27, 2019
Chakrabarti later tried to clarify his statement by stating that one does not have to be a racist to “enable a racist system.”
Didn’t realize this needed to be said, but: you can be someone who does not personally harbor ill will towards a race, but through your actions still enable a racist system. And a lot of New Democrats and Blue Dogs did that today.
— Saikat Chakrabarti (@saikatc) June 27, 2019
This is in reference to my comparing Blue Dogs and New Democrats to 1940s Southern Democrats. Southern Democrats enabled a racist system too. I have no idea how personally racist they all were. And we’re seeing the same dynamic play out now.
— Saikat Chakrabarti (@saikatc) June 27, 2019
But Whitlock had already responded to that point:
This is bad faith nonsense.
But not the least bit surprising from team AOC.
— Matt Whitlock (@mattdizwhitlock) June 27, 2019