Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) added another chapter to their long-running feud on Friday, this time engaging in verbal fisticuffs over whether the progressive lawmaker is a person of color — and culminating in her accusing him of sexual harassment.
The latest bout was prompted by the conservative host’s comments on his ‘Tucker Carlson Tonight’ show where he took issue with the congresswoman referring to herself as a “woman of color” while giving a makeup tutorial, branding her as a “rich entitled white lady” instead.
Terming Ocasio-Cortez’s self-description as “hilariously absurd,” Carlson complained that “no one ever dares to challenge” the idea. “There is no place on Earth outside of American colleges and newsrooms where Sandy Cortez would be recognized as a ‘woman of color,’ because she’s not,” he added, referring to the nickname she reportedly used while in high school.
In response, Ocasio-Cortez, whose mother is from Puerto Rico, tweeted that this was “the type of stuff you say when your name starts with a P and ends with dejo” — an apparent reference to the derogatory Spanish term ‘pendejo’, which means ‘a*****e’ or ‘idiot’.
The segment also focused on an upcoming biography of the 32-year-old Democrat. Calling her “neurotic” and “silly,” he ridiculed the publishers for building Ocasio-Cortez to be a “prophet for our times” and picked out select passages “fawning” over her from the book.
Later, Carlson went so far as to claim that Ocasio-Cortez pointing out that she was alone in an Instagram video sounded “like an invitation to a booty call.”
Ocasio-Cortez hit back in a tweet, describing the remarks as “sexual harassment on air” and calling Carlson a “creep.” She wrote that the “existence of a wife or daughters doesn’t make a man good. And this one is basura,” which translates to ‘trash’ in Spanish.
She revisited the incident on Saturday, tweeting that the comments went beyond the “realm of political commentary” and are “clear, targeted, libelous harassment.”