Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says Sens. Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley's 'craven, self-serving actions' led to 4 deaths during Capitol siege, calls on both to resign

• Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Thursday called on GOP Sens. Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to resign, blaming them for the violence at the Capitol the day before.
• "Sen. Cruz, you must accept responsibility for how your craven, self-serving actions contributed to the deaths of four people yesterday. And how you fundraised off this riot," the New York Democrat said in a tweet.
• Cruz and Hawley were at the forefront of a futile, performative effort to object to the certification of President-elect Joe Biden's Electoral College votes, which was all about winning points with Trump supporters.
• Republican objections to certification helped amplify President Donald Trump's baseless allegations of mass voter fraud, which provoked the Capitol siege.

Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Thursday explicitly blamed GOP Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri for the four deaths that occurred during the Capitol siege, pointing to their support for futile election challenges that helped elevate President Donald Trump's baseless allegations of mass voter fraud.

"Sen. Cruz, you must accept responsibility for how your craven, self-serving actions contributed to the deaths of four people yesterday. And how you fundraised off this riot. Both you and Senator Hawley must resign. If you do not, the Senate should move for your expulsion," Ocasio-Cortez tweeted in response to a tweet from Cruz about Wednesday's attempted coup at the Capitol.

The Capitol siege was provoked by Trump and his false insistence that the 2020 election was stolen from him. He riled up his supporters in a lie-filled speech near the White House on Wednesday before they stormed the Capitol building. The pandemonium caused a delay in the certification of President-elect Joe Biden's Electoral College votes, and marked the most large-scale breach of the Capitol since the War of 1812.

After the violence, a number of senators abandoned plans to object to the certification of results in various states, but Cruz and Hawley were not among them. The GOP effort to challenge certification was inherently about winning points with Trump supporters, and tied to the political ambitions of lawmakers like Cruz and Hawley - both of whom are viewed as 2024 presidential hopefuls.

Given that it would require a majority vote in both chambers for an objection to succeed, it was obvious that the GOP's effort in this regard was fundamentally performative as Democrats control the House.

Ocasio-Cortez was not alone in her criticism of Cruz and Hawley.

Lawmakers and other public officials in Texas have called on Cruz to resign. Democratic Rep. Joaquin Castro of Texas also called on Cruz and Hawley to step down.

And Michael Steele, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, in a tweet excoriated Hawley as Trump's "symbol of this sedition."