BURSTPresident-elect Trump on Wednesday encouraged Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.) to "keep trying" after the congresswoman lost the vote to be the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee in the upcoming Congress.
"Really too bad that AOC lost the Battle for the Leadership Seat in the Democrat Party. She should keep trying. Someday, she will be successful!" Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social Wednesday.
Trump's comment comes after Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) defeated Ocasio-Cortez in a vote Tuesday.
Connolly's win was forecast Monday after the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, headed by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), gave a boost to the congressman after it voted to recommend him for the role. He had also been endorsed by former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who also lobbied on his behalf.
Connolly has a decade more experience than Ocasio-Cortez on the panel, though the New York Democrat has made a name for herself as an unapologetic defender of progressive ideals.
Trump in a bout of rare praise earlier this year said that Ocasio-Cortez, a vocal critic of the Republican leader, has "a good spark" and claimed he warned aides to former Rep. Joe Crowley (D-N.Y.) during his 2018 primary against Ocasio-Cortez that she could be a threat to him politically. She ended up defeating Crowley.
Following the election, Ocasio-Cortez warned about the potential adverse impact of Trump's victory, underscoring what she viewed as freedoms that could be threatened by the president-elect.
“I’m not here to sugarcoat what we all are about to collectively experience, but I think that what we can do to prepare is build community,” Ocasio-Cortez said on an Instagram livestream.
She had cited the Republican trifecta of victories in both chambers of Congress and the White House, mass deportation and the removal of vaccines — a nod to vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is now Trump's pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services — as the cause for her alarm.