This might produce some diametrically opposed commentary (or none).
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) went viral again yesterday.
This time it wasn’t because of her dancing skills or an epic Twitter clapback, but thanks to her sharp questioning of Michael Cohen at the House oversight committee hearing on Wednesday.
The freshman New York congresswoman “expertly laid a trap” to get President Donald Trump’s tax returns, and “won” the Cohen hearing, according to two raving press accounts.
Ocasio-Cortez’s testimony focused primarily on Trump’s alleged deflation of his financial assets in order to lower his tax burden.
First, she zeroed in on Trump Links, a golf course in Ocasio-Cortez’s district that was constructed with $127 million in city taxpayer funds. The city’s deal with Trump nonetheless stipulated that the Trump Organization could keep all of the profits it earned from the course for the first four years.
“This doesn’t seem to be the only time the president has benefited at the expense of the public,” Ocasio-Cortez said, pivoting to the heart of the matter: Whether Trump deliberately deflated the value of Trump National Golf Club in Jupiter, Florida, to lower his local property tax bill.
“To your knowledge, was the president interested in lowering his local real estate tax bills?” she asked.
Ocasio-Cortez confirmed from Cohen that obtaining Trump’s federal and state tax returns would help ascertain the extent of his tax evasion efforts. And she also identified other individuals, such as Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg, who could testify about Trump’s practices prior to Cohen’s arrival in the organization."
