Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez attacks former Trump aide Hope Hicks for 'considering participating in a coverup led by the President'
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez criticized the New York Times on Sunday for writing that former White House aide Hope Hicks is facing an "existential question" over whether to comply with a House subpoena.
- "What gets me is news breaks that this woman is weighing committing a crime before Congress & it's getting framed by the NYT as some Lifetime drama called 'Hope's Choice,'" Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. "This is a [former] admin official considering participating in a coverup led by the President. Treat her equally."
- This comes shortly after the president directed former White House counsel Donald McGahn not to comply with the House Judiciary Committee's subpoena for documents and testimony.
- The White House has not yet said whether it will instruct Hicks to defy the Committee's orders.
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Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressives criticized the New York Times on Sunday for writing that former White House aide Hope Hicks is facing an "existential question" over whether to comply with a congressional subpoena.
Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee have demanded that Hicks produce documents by June 4 and testify before Congress on June 19 as part of the Committee's investigations into possible obstruction of justice and corruption in the Trump administration.
Ocasio-Cortez was critical of the Times' framing of the story, which described Hicks' "dilemma" as an "existential question," rather than a straightforward matter of law and order.
"What gets me is news breaks that this woman is weighing committing a crime before Congress & it's getting framed by the NYT as some Lifetime drama called 'Hope's Choice,'" Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. "This is a [former] admin official considering participating in a coverup led by the President. Treat her equally."
Hicks, who left her position as White House communications director and top confidante to President Donald Trump last year, has not yet indicated whether she'll comply with the legally-binding subpoena.
Ocasio-Cortez then joked that she'd demand royalties if "Hope's Choice" was made into a film and donate the money to the National Bail Out Fund, a criminal justice reform advocacy group.
Others similarly argued that the 30-year-old former Trump confidante is being afforded special privileges because of her status as a well-connected white woman.
"There is nothing for Hope Hicks to 'decide.' She got a subpoena from Congress," Rolling Stone writer Jamil Smith tweeted. "Were she not white, wealthy, and connected, we wouldn't be having this conversation. She would appear, or she would face the threat of prison like the rest of us. As she should."
This comes shortly after the White House directed former White House counsel Donald McGahn not to comply with the House Judiciary Committee's subpoena for documents and testimony. The White House has not yet said whether it will instruct Hicks to defy the Committee's orders. But the Trump administration is stonewalling congressional investigations into the president following the release of special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation report.
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