“Shark Tank” host Kevin O’Leary accused Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Friday’s “CNN This Morning” of “killing jobs.”
O’Leary said many blue states are impossible to invest in because of their “regulatory environment.” He recalled relocating a project in upstate New York to Norway due to the state’s local politicians and policies surrounding businesses and entrepreneurship.
“The regulatory environment is punitive. I had a project in upstate New York behind the grid in Niagara Falls for electricity — a global data center we were building. Eventually it got so bad with the politicians in the local region and the state policy, we moved it to Norway and all the jobs. Norway has it now,” he said. “Thousands of jobs coming out of that. That’s New York. Uninvestable. Sorry. Don’t shoot the messenger. But that’s the way it is, uninvestable.”
O’Leary said he would love to debate Democratic politicians cheering on these policies, particularly Ocasio-Cortez, who he said is “great at killing jobs.” (RELATED: ‘This Is Nuts’: Shark Tank’s ‘Mr. Wonderful’ Blasts Democratic Congressman In Heated Debate Over Biden Stimulus Bill)
“I’ll debate them anytime of the day you want,” he said. “Particularly AOC. She’s great at killing jobs. She kills jobs by the thousands, it’s another New Jersey problem. Where did Amazon take their jobs? They took them away from her. She threatened to sue them if they created jobs. I mean, this is a reality. Sorry, I’m just telling you the truth.”
Amazon canceled its plans to open new headquarters in Ocasio-Cortez’s district in Queens after the New York representative became a leading voice of opposition to the plan, which would have offered thousands of job openings. The cancellation of the new headquarters led to significantly lower favorability ratings for Ocasio-Cortez, with only 12 percent siding with her in a Siena College poll in 2019.
Ocasio-Cortez claimed she fought against Amazon’s “corporate greed, worker exploitation, and the power of the richest man in the world [Jeff Bezos].”