New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez blamed fossil fuel executives on Thursday after waist-high water flooded New York City's subway system due to a storm.
Torrential rain swept through the tri-state area, initiating floods, knocking down trees, all while slowing or preventing travel across the region. The inclement weather hit right before the arrival of Tropical Storm Elsa, which has battered Florida, Georgia and South Carolina, as well as other East Coast states, with winds clocking in at 45 mph to 65 mph.
Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat, used the situation to promote her Green New Deal. Her plan, however doesn't list a budget to implement strategies on the problems it intends to fix. Instead, the Green New Deal gives speculative costs at what the economy stands to lose if it is not implemented. It includes "a risk of damage to $1,000,000,000,000 of public infrastructure and coastal real estate in the United States."
The Heritage Foundation estimates that implementing the deal would result in 1.4 million jobs lost while leaving a "$3.9 trillion hit to economy." The deal mentions its aims to create new-green jobs but makes no mention of a proposed budget to create those jobs. Rather, the deal would be a means to open the door to other green deals, according to NPR.
In a tweet showing a woman wading through murky water in a subway station, Ocasio-Cortez tweeted: "'The Green New Deal, which is a blueprint to create millions of good jobs rebuilding infrastructure to stem climate change & protect vulnerable communities, is unrealistic. Instead we will do the adult thing, which is take orders from fossil fuel execs & make you swim to work.'"
For decades, "bad spending" has left New York's infrastructure in stagnant decline, according to New York Democratic mayoral candidate Eric Adams. Adams, who showed the same woman wading through water in a subway station, used the opportunity to highlight wasteful spending from the current and previous administration in a tweet.
"This is what happens when the [NYC's Metropolitan Transportation Authority] makes bad spending decisions for decades. We need congestion pricing [money] ASAP to protect stations from street flooding, elevate entrances and add green infrastructure to absorb flash storm runoff. This cannot be New York," Adams tweeted.
Talk of addressing infrastructure concerns in the city has been going on since at least 2013.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.