Anti Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Amazon billboard battle escalates
An ongoing clash between Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and the Job Creators Network escalated on Thursday after the small business advocacy group purchased a set of new billboards in Times Square targeting the freshman congresswoman’s handling of a doomed deal to bring Amazon’s second headquarters to New York.
| Ticker | Security | Last | Change | Change % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AMZN | AMAZON.COM INC. | 181.28 | -2.04 | -1.11% |
The right-leaning group put up a large billboard earlier this week with the headline, “Thanks For Nothing, AOC!” days after Amazon announced it had canceled plans for a new headquarters in the borough of Queens due to ongoing opposition from Ocasio-Cortez and other local politicians. Ocasio-Cortez blasted the group in a series of tweets Thursday, referring to the original billboard as “wack” and noting that it was funded by former Home Depot CEO Bernie Marcus, the founder of the Job Creators Network.
In a pair of new billboards, the advocacy group called out Ocasio-Cortez again. One billboard displays the message, “Hey AOC, saw your wack tweet.” A second billboard noted that, while it cost $4,000 to display a message in Times Square, Amazon’s canceled plans cost New York City the 25,000 high-paying jobs the company had promised to bring to the area, as well as some $4 billion in lost wages.
“Facts are facts: while the Job Creators Network did spend some money highlighting the economic consequences of the Amazon pullout, Ocasio-Cortez deprived New York of 25,000 new jobs and $4 billion in annual wages,” said Alfredo Ortiz, JCN President and CEO. “She can call us out all she wants about how we spend our money, but it’s clear that most people care more about how she spends theirs.”
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and Governor Andrew Cuomo lured Amazon to the city with $3 billion in tax incentives. Critics, including Ocasio-Cortez, New York State Sen. Michael Gianaris and other local politicians, argued that the incentives amounted to corporate welfare and would take funding away from more worthy causes.
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Ocasio-Cortez lauded Amazon’s exit on social media last week as a victory over “corporate greed" which outraged many business proponents.
