Correction: A previous version of this report inaccurately stated that Ocasio-Cortez accepted money from JPMorgan Chase & Co and Elevation Partners. The error was based on a separate news report that did not state that the money given to her by those two organizations was not from the organization but was from the organizations’ PACs, their individual members or employees or owners, and those individuals’ immediate families.
The new face of the Democratic Party made inaccurate statements this week about various political issues while appearing on Comedy Central.
Ocasio-Cortez made three false statements within the span of one-minute about Seattle’s minimum wage, wages earned by American citizens, and the size of the U.S. population.
First, Ocasio-Cortez claimed that Seattle’s $15 minimum wage was an example of a $15 minimum wage not hurting an economy, despite the fact that studies have actually shown that it has significantly hurt Seattle’s economy.
Next, Ocasio-Cortez claimed: “One of the biggest problems that we have is 200 million Americans make less than $20,000 a year. That’s 40 percent of this country.”
MRCTV notes that “if 200 million Americans equates to 40 percent of the country, that’d mean there are a whopping 500 million Americans in total. Except that there aren’t – there are about 328 million, meaning that 200 million would make up about 61 percent of the total national population, not 40.”
Her claim that 200 million Americans make less than $20,000 a year is off by tens of millions of people as U.S. Census Bureau statistics show that approximately 28 million American households live on incomes of $25,000 or less and the median household income is over $57,000.
In the most ridiculous part of the interview, Ocasio-Cortez struggled mightily to come up with a rational and coherent explanation of how to pay for her dreams of large government programs.
Axios reporter Jonathan Swan also noted her completely false claims at the end of the segment about the U.S. military: