The House Office of Congressional Ethics has found “substantial reason to believe” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, “may have accepted impermissible gifts associated with her attendance at the Met Gala in 2021,” according to a report issued Thursday.
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“If Rep. Ocasio-Cortez accepted impermissible gifts, then she may have violated House rules, standards of conduct, and federal law,” the report said.
According to the Office of Congressional Ethics, Ocasio-Cortez improperly accepted gifts, including tickets and transportation to the 2021 Met Gala, in addition to her makeup, hairstyling, and infamous “Tax the Rich” dress. While the New York congresswoman eventually paid personally for the gifts, OCE says she did not do so until after they began their investigation.
“While Rep. Ocasio-Cortez appears to have now paid for the rental value of the attire she wore to the Met Gala, and for the goods and services she and her partner received in connection with this September 2021 event, payment for these goods and services did not occur until after the OCE contacted her in connection with this review,” the congressional watchdog wrote on Thursday.
Ocasio throws her aide to the wolves
The Bronx and Queens rep, 33, claimed to investigators with the Office of Congressional Ethics she was unaware that thousands of dollars for her dress rental, shoes, hair, makeup and other accouterments went unpaid for months after the event, leaving her open to allegations of improperly accepting gifts.
“I just never, ever, ever would have allowed that to happen knowing what I have learned,” Ocasio-Cortez said during a May 2022 interview. “But I wasn’t privy to the invoices, wasn’t privy to the ones that had been sent.”
The “Squad” member claimed her underling had access to her credit cards and was tasked with paying the hair stylists, makeup artists, and dressmakers.~NY Post
Tfw you wear a “tax the rich” dress to an event that costs $30,000 for a ticket and $275,000 for a table
pic.twitter.com/fyNpGUQC4h— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) September 14, 2021
The OCE’s nonpartisan board recommended in June 2022 that the House Ethics Committee further investigate the allegations against Ocasio-Cortez. In December 2022, the Committee announced that they were probing the congresswoman but did not specify the subject of the matter.
“The Board recommends that the Committee further review the above allegation concerning Rep. Ocasio-Cortez because there is substantial reason to believe that she accepted impermissible gifts associated with her attendance at the Met Gala in 2021.”
The board’s recommendation was made unanimously by a vote of 5-0.
Ocasio-Cortez and her longtime boyfriend Riley Roberts were invited to the 2021 Met Gala as guests of Vogue Editor-in-Chief Anna Wintour. The American Accountability Foundation wrote an ethics complaint the following year, stating,
“Specifically we believe Representative Ocasio-Cortez has violated [the Gift Rule] by accepting admission to the Met Gala, an event whose per seat costs is reported to range from $35,000 to $50,000 without having a permissible exemption to allow the acceptance of the lavish gift.”
The congresswoman reportedly told the ethics office that arrangements had been made in advance of the Gala that she would eventually pay for the attire and services, and did not intend to accept them as gifts.
In a response to the ethics board’s report, counsel for Ocasio-Cortez wrote,
“Though no Ethics violation has been found, the Office of Congressional Ethics did identify that there were delays in paying vendors for costs associated with the Congresswoman’s attendance at the Met Gala. The Congresswoman finds these delays unacceptable, and she has taken several steps to ensure nothing of this nature will ever happen again.”
David Mitrani, Ocasio-Cortez’s lead attorney, continued, saying that “while regrettable,” the issue “definitively does not rise to the level of a violation of House Rules or of federal law.”
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“[T]here is no evidence that she ever intended to avoid these expenses… We are confident the Committee on Ethics will dismiss this matter,” he added.
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