“I’m taking into account who works against other members in primaries and who doesn’t,” Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) reportedly said prior to the vote to award the key committee position to Rep. Kathleen Rice over Ocasio-Cortez."
"Freshman New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was snubbed Thursday during a private Democrat committee meeting held to decide a key House Energy and Commerce Committee seat, and it wasn’t even a close vote.
"According to Politico, Ocasio-Cortez lost out to fellow NY Rep. Kathleen Rice in a 46-13 vote, and at points during the run-up to the vote, tensions ran high:
Just before the Steering Committee moved to vote on the Energy and Commerce slots, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her leadership team presented a slate of their preferred candidates for four out of the five seats.
But notably, top Democrats did not choose a nominee for the final seat, which is essentially reserved for a New York member — forcing Rice and Ocasio-Cortez into a head-to-head matchup.
The panel launched into an intense round of speeches on each candidate, with several Democrats speaking up to lobby against Ocasio-Cortez, a freshman member and social media star who is seen as a political threat by many of the caucus’s moderates for her far-left policies.
"The piece also noted that some Democrats who took part in the video conference call spoke against AOC by pointing out that she supported primary challengers to their re-election campaigns:
On the video call, several Democrats called out Ocasio-Cortez’s efforts to help liberal challengers take out their own incumbents, as well as her refusal to pay party campaign dues.
“I’m taking into account who works against other members in primaries and who doesn’t,” Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) said on the call, according to multiple sources. Cuellar successfully fended off a primary challenge from Jessica Cisneros, who Ocasio-Cortez supported.
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