AOC to lead politicians recounting Capitol ordeal in special hearing as GOP lawmakers attack her story

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will lead members of Congress in a special House hearing sharing their personal experiences of the 6 January storming of the Capitol.

The special order hour scheduled for this evening comes after Ms Ocasio-Cortez slammed Republican freshman South Carolina Representative Nancy Mace.

She accused Mace of "contradicting your own account to attack me for Fox News clicks," after Ms Mace said that she was "two doors down" from Ms Ocasio-Cortez during the Capitol riot and "no insurrectionists stormed our hallway".

The Congresswoman from Queens called Ms Mace's comments a "deeply cynical and disgusting attack".

"As the Capitol complex was stormed and people were being killed, none of us knew in the moment what areas were compromised. You previously told reporters yourself that you barricaded in your office, afraid you’d be hurt," she tweeted, attaching a screenshot of a story that appears to be from a story by South Carolina paper The State.

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Ms Ocasio-Cortez added: "It’s honestly pretty sad to see you turn around like this and throw other people under the bus. Thought you’d be better."

In an hour and a half long Instagram live broadcast on Monday, Ms Ocasio-Cortez revealed that she is a survivor of sexual assault. Speaking about those who emphasize the need to move on from the Capitol riot, she said: "These are the tactics that abusers use, the folks who are saying, ‘We should move on,’ ‘we shouldn't have accountability,’ etc, are saying: ‘Can you just forget about this so we can do it again?'" she said.

She added: “I’m a survivor of sexual assault. And I haven’t told many people that in my life. But when we go through trauma, trauma compounds on each other. And so whether you had a negligent or, you know, neglectful parents and, or whether you had someone who was verbally abusive to you."

Fox News host Tucker Carlson said that discussing her experience during the storming of the Capitol was “narcissism on parade," and that she was “wallowing around in Lake Me”.

Mr Carlson said: “There she is again. Defender of the common man, yammering on about the only subject she really cares about - herself... The perfect symbol of a culture dying from self-involvement. We've said that before and we've laughed as we did. But actually, it's not funny. People will believe this crap. Some already do.”