Chris Hayes asked AOC:
“Congresswoman, it does look like we are headed towards a shutdown. What do you see as the Democratic strategy and message here for a government funding bill?”
AOC responded:
“I mean, Chris, we’re here to help people. We are here in the midst of this destruction of the federal government, the federal safety net, a trillion dollars eviscerated from people’s healthcare, their Medicare, their Medicaid, in this country with prices that are skyrocketing and life becoming completely untenable for the American people, we are here to try to be a backstop and to be that backstop, which is what the American people have elected us to do.”
That “trillion dollars eviscerated” claim is a direct reference to the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (BBB), passed earlier this year. The law did include changes to Medicaid — slowing its growth and tightening eligibility — but AOC’s language is deliberately misleading. No trillion dollars vanished from existing programs. Even under BBB, Medicare and Medicaid will still grow every single year, just not as fast as originally projected. Her “trillion dollars eviscerated” line is political theater — a scare tactic meant to frighten voters, not an honest accounting.
When AOC says Democrats are “here to help people,” she doesn’t mean American citizens. She means prioritizing illegal immigrants over them. If AOC and her Democrat Party were truly the “backstop” she describes, they would be supporting President Trump’s mission to secure America’s borders, stop illegal immigration, and put Americans first. Instead, they divert non-stop hundreds of billions toward illegals while forcing Americans to foot the bill.
And beyond the financial burden, there’s the human toll that AOC, Chris Hayes, and Democrats never acknowledge. Illegal immigrants kill, rape, and rob Americans every single day in every state — crimes made possible by Democrat open-border policies. Illegals come first, while Americans are left paying the price in dollars and in blood. How exactly does any of that help Americans? AOC talks about helping people, but the reality is Democrats constantly put illegals first and Americans last. That’s not a backstop — that’s betrayal.