Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez called Republicans who attacked her for taking a trip to Miami, “creepy weirdos”, and said they were mad they cannot date her.

       Ms Ocasio-Cortez was photographed with her boyfriend at a restaurant in Miami earlier this week not wearing a mask.

       At its core, the row is about differing responses to Covid-19. Ms Ocasio-Cortez’s homestate of New York has taken an aggressive measures to combat the virus that causes Covid-1 and New York City has a vaccine mandate.

       Conversely, Florida Gov Ron DeSantis has taken a much more lax approach, opposing mask mandates and keeping businesses mostly open. He’s also signed legislation restricting vaccine mandates. All of this has made him a darling of the right and a potential candidate for president.

       The conservative National Review noted that Ms Ocasio-Cortez’s visit came despite a surge of the Omicron variant in New York, even though Florida has also seen a spike in Covid-19 as well because of travel.

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       In response to the trip, conservatives made #AOCLovesDeSantis trend on Twitter. But Ms Ocasio-Cortez criticised conservatives for their obsession with her. In particularly, she responded to a tweet from former Trump adviser Steve Cortes, who criticised her boyfriend for wearing sandals.

       “If Republicans are mad they can’t date me they can just say that instead of projecting their sexual frustrations onto my boyfriend’s feet,” she said. “Ya creepy weirdos.”

       She also said that many of the men criticising her need therapy but won’t go to it.

       “It’s starting to get old ignoring the very obvious, strange, and deranged sexual frustrations that underpin the Republican fixation on me, women,& LGBT+ people in general,” she tweeted.