Pressley responds to Pelosi dismissal of votes against border bill

Massachusetts Rep. Ayanna Pressley responded Monday evening to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) remarks about Pressley’s and three other freshman Democrats’ votes against a President Trump-backed border aid bill.

“This is an issue of consequence to the country and [the 7th Congressional District], specifically, which is 40 percent immigrant,” Pressley told the Boston NPR affiliate WGBH on its program “Greater Boston.”

{mosads}In an interview with The New York Times published over the weekend, Pelosi said Pressley — as well as Democratic Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (N.Y.), Ilhan Omar (Minn.) and Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) — “have their public whatever and their Twitter world” but “didn’t have any following.”

“They’re four people and that’s how many votes they got,” Pelosi added.

“I do not believe that that advances the cause, or helps our party or strengthens us going into 2020,” Pressley said.

“I sat at the table and worked to improve that House bill to get in protections that were not there around health standards, and to offer some metrics of transparency and accountability,” she added, saying she ultimately voted against it because of what she felt was a lack of accountability for Border Patrol.

Pressley appeared on the show with Rep. Joe Kennedy III (D-Mass.) after they both visited migrant detention facilities in El Paso and Clint, Texas, last week. Pressley and Kennedy both said they witnessed unprofessional behavior from Border Patrol on the visit.

Pressley told WGBH that women in the facility told them they had been housed in outdoor tents but abruptly moved indoors before the congressional delegation arrived, with some women saying they did not know where their children were.

“It was clear that this is a culture that is corrupt, that is chaotic, that is callous,” she added, saying the immigration system was not “broken, but it’s actually doing what it was designed to do. This is about the criminalizing of people who are seeking asylum.”