Ocasio-Cortez plans visit to Kentucky despite being disinvited by GOP colleague

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) still has plans to visit Kentucky despite one of her GOP colleagues walking back an invitation for her to visit his district.

A spokesman for Ocasio-Cortez told CNN on Friday that the congresswoman has since received another invite to visit the state and plans to follow through on the offer. 

“Luckily, we still have open borders with Kentucky, we are free to travel there,” the spokesman, Corbin Trent, said.

“We hope to visit and have a town hall, listen to concerns of workers in Kentucky,” he added.

{mosads}The timing of the trip remains unclear. Ocasio-Cortez’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Hill. 

Last month, Rep. Andy Barr (R-Ky.) offered to host Ocasio-Cortez in his district to meet with families and discuss the potential impacts that her proposed Green New Deal would have on local residents.

At the time, he urged the congresswoman to visit his district and accompany him on a trip to a coal mine to learn about how local workers risk having their jobs affected by the proposal.

In response, Ocasio-Cortez said that she’d “be happy to go to Kentucky” and that she’d “also like to note that in the Green New Deal, one of the things I advocate for is fully funding the pensions of coal miners in West Virginia and throughout Appalachia because we want a just transition to make sure that we’re investing in jobs across those swaths of the country.” 

However, Barr walked back the invite following Ocasio-Cortez’s involvement in a back and forth with Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) on Twitter about the congressman’s refusal to support the 9/11 Victim’s Compensation Fund and his attacks on Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.). 

Barr said in a letter sent to Ocasio-Cortez’s office after the spat that his invitation for her “to come to Kentucky to learn how the Green New Deal could impact hard-working Americans in eastern and central Kentucky was in good faith with the expectation that you too were interested.” 

“But your recent comments about Congressman Crenshaw demonstrate a lack of civility that is becoming far too common in the U.S. House of Representatives,” he added.

Ocasio-Cortez joked in a tweet responding to Barr’s rescinded invitation that “we’ve got ‘em on their back foot stutter-stepping.”

“GOP thought they could catch us with a bluff,” she tweeted Wednesday.