House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said on Wednesday that her San Francisco Congressional District is so liberal that progressive constituents refer to her as a “corporate pawn.”
Pelosi made her remarks after reporters asked her about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s shocking upset of Rep. Joe Crowley (D-NY) on Tuesday evening and whether Democratic Socialism is ascendant in her party.
“It’s ascendant in that district perhaps. But I don’t accept any characterization of our party presented by the Republicans. So let me reject that right now,” Pelosi said.
Pelosi, known for her ability to raise money like nobody else on the left in Congress, added of Republicans: “They spend tens of millions of dollars characterizing me as this left-wing person where in my District they call me a corporate pawn because my district is so progressive.”
Crowley outspent Ocasio-Cortez ten to one, but Ocasio-Cortez’s used Crowley’s corporate contributions against him, making the race about the people in her district versus Crowley’s corporate donors.
“This race is about people versus money. We’ve got people. They’ve got money,” Ocasio-Cortez said in her viral campaign commercial. “It’s time that a Democrat who takes corporate money, profits off foreclosure, doesn’t live here, doesn’t send his kids to our schools, doesn’t drink our water, or breathe our air cannot possibly represent us.”