Pelosi Says She and Ocasio-Cortez Don’t Have ‘That Many Differences’

(Bloomberg) -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sought to smooth over public grievances with high-profile progressive Democrat Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez after a private meeting with the New York freshman Friday morning.

As she left the meeting, Pelosi declined to describe the conversation and downplayed any disputes she’s had with Ocasio-Cortez and other progressives in the House. She likened the situation to disagreements within a family.

“Does your family always agree on everything?” she asked at a news conference later. While there may be differences of approach within the Democratic caucus, “Respect that instead of making a big issue out of it.”

Ocasio-Cortez, whose prominent profile has created friction with some other Democrats, departed without speaking to reporters.

The speaker also posted on Twitter a photo of the two together and wrote, “Today, Congresswoman @RepAOC and I sat down to discuss working together to meet the needs of our districts and our country, fairness in our economy and diversity in our country.”

Many House members have already left Washington for a six-week recess, and Pelosi is keen for their message in their home districts to be one of accomplishment in the first 200 days of this legislative session rather than disputes within the party.

The meeting came after months of public sniping between the two women, some of which also involved other progressive newcomers in the House known along with Ocasio-Cortez, 29, as “The Squad.”

Ocasio-Cortez, Ayanna Pressley, 45, of Massachusetts, Ilhan Omar, 37, of Minnesota and Rashida Tlaib, 43, of Michigan, have agitated party moderates -- and Pelosi, 79, as well -- with their aggressive push for sweeping policies favored by the left, such as Medicare for All and the Green New Deal.

But they and other progressive Democrats stood behind Pelosi in her election for speaker early this year amid calls by some moderate members for the California Democrat to step aside for younger leadership.

There have been some testy exchanges between Pelosi and Ocasio-Cortez. Pelosi seemed to be dismissive of Ocasio-Cortez’s “Green New Deal,” an ambitious but vague resolution to address climate change.

“That’s not legislation. It’s a list of aspirations,” Pelosi said in an interview with USAToday.

‘Public Whatever’

More recently, the tensions were exacerbated after the four freshmen women voted against a border bill supported by Pelosi that they said didn’t set adquate standards for the treatment of migrants.

“All these people have their public whatever and their Twitter world,” Pelosi said in an interview with the New York Times’s columnist Maureen Dowd. “But they didn’t have any following. They’re four people and that’s how many votes they got.”

Ocasio-Cortez had tweeted that the House passage of that Senate-passed bill without any negotiations for changes would be “an abdication of power we should refuse to accept. They will keep hurting kids if we do.” She also took to Twitter to fire back at some of Pelosi’s dismissive quotes.

Ocasio-Cortez’s stances and provocative pronouncements have made her and the three other first-term progressives favorite targets of Republicans and President Donald Trump, who are trying to make them the face of the Democratic Party heading into the election. That is a risk for moderate Democrats who will be trying to hang on to swing districts where they unseated Republicans in 2018.

Another source of frustration is that a progressive group with ties to Ocasio-Cortez has been backing 2020 primary challenges against some House Democrats, including some of Pelosi’s top lieutenants, such as Representative Eliot Engel of New York.

Engel said in an interview with Bloomberg last week he’d obviously prefer Democrats focus on unseating Republicans, not each other, and work together on legislation. “I think that is what we all need to do. If we get involved in internecine warfare, it’s not going to benefit anybody but the other party,” he said.

Senator Bernie Sanders, in an interview with NBC earlier this month, said he believed Pelosi was being a bit rough on Ocasio-Cortez and the other members of “The Squad.”

“You cannot ignore the young people of this country who are passionate about economic and racial and social and environmental justice,” Sanders said. “You got to bring them in, not alienate them.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Billy House in Washington at bhouse5@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Joe Sobczyk at jsobczyk@bloomberg.net, Laurie Asséo

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