Ocasio-Cortez Schools Sanders On The Bible After Telling Her To Leave Climate Change Up To ‘Much Higher Authority’

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y) on Wednesday responded to White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders telling her to leave climate change up to a “much higher authority,” presumably referring to God.

Fox News host Sean Hannity asked Sanders on Tuesday night to respond to a statement by the New York 14th District congresswoman that greenhouse gas emissions have to be dramatically curbed the next twelve years to avoid catastrophe.

“Millennials and Gen Z, all these folks that will come after us, are looking up and we’re like: ‘The world is gonna end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change and your biggest issue is, how are we gonna pay for it?’” Ocasio-Cortez said on Monday.

Ocasio-Cortez was referring to a report issued last year by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change which concluded that averting catastrophic consequences requires a historically unprecedented transformation of energy consumption by 2030. In the report, the world’s leading climate scientists warned “there are only a dozen years for global warming to be kept to a maximum of 1.5C, beyond which even half a degree will significantly worsen the risks of drought, floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people,” reports The Guardian.

“Look, I don’t think we’re going to listen to her on much of anything, particularly not on matters we’re gonna leave in the hands of a much, much higher authority, and certainly not listen to the freshman congresswoman on when the world may end,” said Sanders, who graduated from Ouachita Baptist University and is the daughter of Pastor Mike Huckabee. “We’re focused on what’s happening in the world right now.”

The freshman lawmaker responded to Sanders on Twitter Wednesday, invoking scripture in defense of her impassioned pleas to address climate change.

“God looked on the world & called it good not once, not twice, but seven times,” Ocasio-Cortez cited from Genesis. “God commands all people to ‘serve and protect’ creation.”

“God mandates that not only the people, but the land that sustains them, shall be respected,” cited from Genesis.

“Genesis 1: God looked on the world & called it good not once, not twice, but seven times.

Genesis 2: God commands all people to “serve and protect” creation.

Leviticus: God mandates that not only the people, but the land that sustains them, shall be respected.” https://t.co/AhWd3vuVBd

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 23, 2019

“You shouldn’t need a Bible to tell you to protect our planet, but it does anyway,” Ocasio-Cortez noted.

You shouldn’t need a Bible to tell you to protect our planet, but it does anyway.

(h/t to @RELEVANT mag for source excerpts that I adapted for the previous tweet)

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 23, 2019