Progressive Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Republican U.S. Senator Ted Cruz may be joining forces to keep former members of Congress from turning their expertise into profit as paid lobbyists. The unlikely pairing has some people on Twitter baffled, but also encouraged.
Rep. Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, tweeted Thursday that she believed members of Congress should not be allowed to "leverage your service" to become a lobbyist.
"I don’t think it should be legal at ALL to become a corporate lobbyist if you’ve served in Congress," Ocasio-Cortez wrote. "At minimum there should be a long wait period."
That's when Sen. Cruz, R-Texas, piped in.
"Here’s something I don’t say often: on this point, I AGREE with @AOC Indeed, I have long called for a LIFETIME BAN on former Members of Congress becoming lobbyists. The Swamp would hate it, but perhaps a chance for some bipartisan cooperation?" Cruz tweeted.
Ocasio-Cortez took the opportunity to reach out to Cruz -- with a specific condition.
"@tedcruz if you’re serious about a clean bill, then I’m down. Let’s make a deal," she wrote. "If we can agree on a bill with no partisan snuck-in clauses, no poison pills, etc - just a straight, clean ban on members of Congress becoming paid lobbyists - then I’ll co-lead the bill with you."
Cruz had a simple, two-word response.
"You're on."
The potential team of Ocasio-Cortez, the freshman member of Congress who is at the far left of the Democratic party, and Cruz, the former Republican presidential candidate from one of the reddest states in the country, led to some surprised reactions on Twitter.
"This is the kind of threads that make me happy. Two people of wildly different political views come together to SOLVE problems. Lets see if they can actually work something out," Alex Yaple tweeted.
"This would be amazing. Let it be the start of a series of Clean Bills. Maybe DACA could be next," tweeted Jennifer Vipond, a self-described moderate conservative who ran for Congress last year in Wisconsin's fifth district.
"The world is ending because now I agree with @tedcruz agreeing with @AOC," wrote Cenk Uygur, a progressive and the host of "The Young Turks."
Some people had other suggestions for what the pair of Cruz and Ocasio-Cortez could accomplish, such as campaign finance reform and term limits.
And then, there were the requisite GIFs.
