Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was called out on social media over photographs near a migrant detention center that critics said appeared to be staged during her 2018 campaign, a charge that her office denied.
The "previously unpublished" pictures came to light when a photographer, Ivan Pierre Aguirre, posted them on his Twitter account. He said that they were taken last year in Tornillo, Texas.
The New York Democrat tweeted out the post, writing that she'll "never forget this, because it was the moment I saw with my own eyes that the America I love was becoming a nation that steals refugee children from their parents,& caged them. More kids died after this. To date, no one has been held accountable. We need to save these kids.”
The tweet was, however, called out by some on social media who claimed that the pictures near a chain-linked fence appeared to be "staged." There's one image of Ocasio-Cortez apparently bent over in anguish and there's another with her hands covering her face.