AOC Blames Texas’ Power Outages On Refusing To ‘Pursue A Green New Deal’
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) slammed Texas politicians over the current waves of cold weather and power outages.
AOC claimed on Twitter, “The infrastructure failures in Texas are quite literally what happens when you *don’t* pursue a Green New Deal. Weak on sweeping next-gen public infrastructure investments, little focus on equity so communities are left behind, climate deniers in leadership so they don’t long prep for disaster. We need to help people *now.* Long-term we must realize these are the consequences of inaction.”
Weak on sweeping next-gen public infrastructure investments, little focus on equity so communities are left behind, climate deniers in leadership so they don’t long prep for disaster.
We need to help people *now.* Long-term we must realize these are the consequences of inaction.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) February 17, 2021
Former Virginia Congressman Denver Riggleman refuted AOC’s claims. “This is ‘quite literally’ false. There are many factors that contributed to the Texas situation, most evident being a winter storm (things like cold and ice) and lack of preparation. Facts and analysis are the answer, not rhetoric.”
Conservative pundit Erick Erickson slammed AOC as well. “Yes, the snow-covered solar panels and frozen wind turbines would have been so much more effective by themselves.”
Chuck DeVore from the Texas Public Policy Foundation slammed green energy subsidies for possibly exacerbating the problem. “We lost the thermal power because operators couldn’t see a return on investment due to be undercut by wind and solar, which is cheap for two reasons – it’s subsidized and it doesn’t have to pay for the costs of grid reliability by purchasing battery farms or contracting with gas peaker plants to produce power when needed, not when they can.”
Governor Gregg Abbot slammed ERCOT, the entity that manages Texas power. He has called for an investigation into their practices.
“This is something that I declared in advance … this is something that our team had been talking to them about in advance, knowing, in advance, the ultra-cold we were going to be dealing with. … There seemed to be a lack of preparation, and making sure we did have access to back-up power in the event that the power generators were incapable of generating power, but all that aside …. they should be providing greater transparency. They are a public entity. They deserve to tell you, as well as government leaders, exactly what is going and what is not going on and they are not stepping up and providing that level of transparency.”