It turns out some of the country’s best-known and most infamous Democratic women seem to have a strangely flexible concept of marriage.
While progressives tend to despise the institution, they appear to have an appreciation for it under certain circumstances (particularly circumstances involving two men and a baby).
But when it really suits their personal desires and, even better, their personal finances, boy how liberals love it.
First, there was Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, the Somalia-born immigrant, who has been credibly accused of presenting her own brother as her husband in a scam to help him move to the front of the line in obtaining immigration papers.
Next, New York Democratic Attorney General Letitia James found herself under investigation for real estate activities that reportedly included listing herself as her father’s “wife” for mortgage purposes.
Then, as July drew to a close, the bipartisan House Ethics Committee issued a report on New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s attendance at the 2021 Met Gala — a soiree of the rich and fatuous where Ocasio-Cortez appeared wearing an obnoxious “Tax the Rich” designer gown on the arm of a man who isn’t her “spouse” — by any definition of the word.
That last part matters a great deal because, according to the committee report, the New York City democratic socialist accepted a free ticket for then-boyfriend, now-fiance Riley Roberts (a beau whose status with AOC appears to depend on which form she’s filling out).
And there’s more to this than just a standard liberal grift.
Congressional ethics rules in force at the time, according to the report, allowed House members to accept free attendance at such events only “for themselves and either a spouse or dependent child.”
The report then helpfully noted that the House Ethics Manual defines “spouse” as “someone to whom you are legally married.”
To be fair, that’s a footnote from page 39 of the manual, but most Americans were probably already hip to that definition without needing to be told. Ethics manuals, however, have to spell things out.
Unfortunately, that’s only effective if the lawmakers covered by the manual actually choose to accept the manual’s definitions, which AOC did not.
According to the report, Ocasio-Cortez’s legal counsel claimed “the Congresswoman chose to follow campaign finance laws,” adding that such a determination “was and is a reasonable and logical conclusion to make, and the Committee should not so brazenly apply guidance limited to other sets of rules in other contexts.”
Hellbound and Down 