Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez deleted a tweet which appeared to celebrate oil prices plummeting as a result of the economic downfall caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
“You absolutely love to see it,” Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) wrote Monday night on Twitter before deleting the post, “This along with record low interest rates means it’s the right time for a worker-led, mass investment in green infrastructure to save our planet. *cough*”
The progressive darling was referring to oil prices plunging more than $10-a-barrel into negative territory, the first time in history.
As a result, the Dow Jones industrial average tumbled as much as 507.44 points, or about 2.1 percent, at the open after posting gains for two consecutive weeks.
After facing some criticism for the tweet, she took it down and sent out another post.
“This snapshot is being acknowledged as a turning point in the climate movement,” she wrote in her revised post, “Fossil fuels are in long-term structural decline. This along w/ low interest rates means it‘s the right time to create millions of jobs transitioning to renewable and clean energy. A key opportunity.”
Her new tweet was also a response to Twitter user @muckrakery, who had posted, “Oil prices now at ‘negative values,’ meaning oil producers have to pay people to take it off their hands and store it because when demand plunges (like now), that is less expensive for them than building more storage and/or shutting wells down.”
On Tuesday, President Trump proposed establishing a relief fund for the oil and gas industry as a result of the economic plunge.
“We will never let the great U.S. Oil & Gas Industry down. I have instructed the Secretary of Energy and Secretary of the Treasury to formulate a plan which will make funds available so that these very important companies and jobs will be secured long into the future!” Trump wrote on Twitter.
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