Representative Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from New York, went after Representative Higgins, a Republican from Louisiana, for yelling at witness during a hearing about the climate crisis. In the headed exchange that Representative Ocasio-Cortez is referring to, Representative Higgins berated the witness, who is the Executive Director of the Energy Justice Law and Policy Center, and spoke down to her using terms like “boo” and “good lady”.
OCASIO-CORTEZ: “In the four years that I've sat on this committee, I have never seen members of Congress, Republican or Democrat, disrespect a witness in the way that I have seen them disrespect you today. I do not care what party they are in, I've never seen anything like that. And for the gentleman of Louisiana, and the comfort that he felt in yelling at you like that, there's more than one way to get a point across. And frankly, men who treat women like that in public, I fear how they treat them in private. We can be better than this. We don't have to resort to yelling.”
