Flashback: AOC Urged Biden to Disregard Certain Federal Court Rulings

A resurfaced video from 2023 shows Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a prominent member of the progressive “Squad,” telling CNN’s Anderson Cooper that President Joe Biden should “ignore” federal court decisions that she and fellow Democrats find objectionable.

The clip is making the rounds again as Democrats voice frustration over President Donald Trump’s alleged failure to follow a Supreme Court ruling regarding a deported MS-13 member. The order in question, however, included language that many have deemed unclear.

During the CNN interview, Ocasio-Cortez was asked to comment on a decision by a federal judge in Texas—appointed by Trump—that halted the FDA's approval of an abortion pill.

“When you’ve heard the news this afternoon, a couple of hours ago. What did you think?” Cooper asked her.

The congresswoman responded: “Well, you know, I think rulings like this, and I think we’ve seen from the FDA and also from activity in Congress that some of these rulings, I think we’ve been preparing and anticipating for there being these egregious overreaches by members of the judiciary appointed by a right-wing Republican Party, whose goal for a very long time was to just pack these Courts with partisan judges often under qualified or completely unqualified for the for their role.”

She went on to endorse a course of action suggested by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), saying: “And so there has been thought, I believe, given to this. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) has already issued statements, for example, advising what we should do in situations like this, which I concur with, which is that I believe that the Biden Administration should ignore this ruling.”

Ocasio-Cortez further argued: “I think that we — you know, the courts have the legitimacy, and they rely on the legitimacy of their rulings. And what they are currently doing is engaged in an unprecedented and dramatic erosion of the legitimacy of the courts. It is the Justices themselves through the deeply partisan and unfounded nature of these rulings that are undermining their own enforcement.”

When Cooper followed up by asking, “So what you’re saying, the Biden administration should ignore this court. But what does that look like? What does that actually mean?” she clarified her stance.

“You know, I think the interesting thing when it comes to a ruling is that it relies on enforcement. And it is up to the Biden Administration to enforce, to choose whether or not to enforce such a ruling,” she replied.

Fast forward to the present, and Ocasio-Cortez has taken to social media to criticize the Trump administration for not bringing Kilmar Abrego Garcia back from a prison in El Salvador. Though the Supreme Court didn’t explicitly demand his return, it did instruct the administration to “facilitate” it—yet El Salvador’s government has reportedly refused to cooperate.

“Kilmar Abrego Garcia has been sitting in a Salvadoran prison for over a month because the Trump Admin made a mistake. Now, the Admin is defying SCOTUS & refusing to bring him back. If we allow Trump to violate Kilmar’s rights, none of our rights are safe. Kilmar is all of us,” she wrote on X.

In a joint statement with Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-MD), she further emphasized: “Your administration has admitted that Mr. Abrego Garcia’s removal was an ‘administrative error.’ As such, the Supreme Court of the United States ordered, in a unanimous ruling, that your administration must ‘facilitate’ Mr. Abrego Garcia’s ‘release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.’ This would mean his return to the United States.”

They concluded by saying: “The U.S. government must comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling and do everything in its power to get Mr. Abrego Garcia back to his family in the United States as quickly as possible.”