This Tuesday night, Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez confirmed that she plans to pay her interns at least $15 an hour.
In a post to Twitter, Ocasio-Cortez declared that it’s “time to walk the walk.”
“Very few members of Congress actually pay their interns,” she wrote. “We will be one of them.”
Time to walk the walk.
Very few members of Congress actually pay their interns. We will be one of them. https://t.co/BuKCDSai0K
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) December 5, 2018
Her tweet came after The Washington Post’s Jeff Stein confirmed her pledge with her chief of staff.
On Monday. Ocasio-Cortez tweeted that she visited a D.C. restaurant where she met several employees who also worked on Capitol Hill.
“This is a disgrace. Congress of ALL places should raise [Members’ Representational Allowances] so we can pay staff an actual DC living wage,” she wrote.
“It is unjust for Congress to budget a living wage for ourselves, yet rely on unpaid interns & underpaid overworked staff just bc Republicans want to make a statement about ‘fiscal responsibility,'” she added.
From The Hill:
A 2017 report from nonprofit group Pay Our Interns found that in the Senate 51 percent of Republicans and 31 percent of Democrats pay their interns.
And in the House, the study found that just 8 percent of Republicans and 3.6 percent of Democrats pay interns.
Both chambers included funds to pay interns in appropriations bills earlier this year, set to take effect in 2019.
According to NPR, only three members of Congress currently pay their interns a living wage: Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Doug Jones (D-AL), and Adam Smith (D-WA).
Featured image via screen grab/YouTube
