Claim:
During a live C-SPAN broadcast, U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., scolded Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Democratic Party leadership over their “Green New Deal 2.0” costing $93 trillion.
Rating:
A rumor that circulated online in November 2025 claimed a live C-SPAN broadcast showed U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., scolding Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Democratic Party leadership over their “Green New Deal 2.0” costing $93 trillion.
On Nov. 10, a Facebook user named Kienen-Patricia-Natasja shared the claim with a collage of photos of Schumer, Ocasio-Cortez and Kennedy. The post was headlined “KENNEDY JUST EXECUTED AOC, SCHUMER & THE ENTIRE DEM LEADERSHIP ON LIVE C-SPAN – CHAMBER WENT FUNERAL-QUIET IN 38 SECONDS.”
Other users shared this same story word-for-word on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn (archived), Truth Social and X (archived), as well as at least two blogs.
(Kienen-Patricia-Natasja/Facebook)
The post began as follows:
KENNEDY JUST EXECUTED AOC, SCHUMER & THE ENTIRE DEM LEADERSHIP ON LIVE C-SPAN – CHAMBER WENT FUNERAL-QUIET IN 38 SECONDS
Senate Floor. AOC was mid-sentence, waving her printed Green New Deal 2.0 like a victory flag.
“Senator Kennedy refuses to support our $93 trillion climate justice plan because he’s a dinosaur who—”
Kennedy stood up, slow, holding a plain manila folder labeled “DEM RECEIPTS – DO NOT BEND.”
He didn’t wait for the chair to recognize him. He just started reading, voice like molasses over broken glass:
“Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Net worth jump 2020-2025: $29,000 → $12.4 million
Campaign promise: ‘No corporate PAC money’
Actual donors: BlackRock, Google, Pfizer – $4.7 million in dark money funneled through ActBlue shells
Bartender story: last W-2 showed $26k – while mommy’s seven rental properties paid the real bills
Green New Deal co-author: Saikat Chakrabarti – fired for funneling $1.2 million to his own LLC”
He flipped the page.
“Chuck Schumer
‘Working class hero’ from Brooklyn
Current residence: $8.2 million Park Slope brownstone
Wife’s net worth: $47 million from Goldman Sachs board seat
The rest of the post claimed the alleged C-SPAN video received “28 million concurrent viewers,” and that “#KennedyMassplode trended #1 worldwide for 36 straight hours.”
In short, the rumor was false. No such C-SPAN video exists. Kennedy made no such remarks, nor did Ocasio-Cortez — a House member — speak on the Senate floor. The story featured fabricated details about Ocasio-Cortez, as well as Schumer and his wife, Iris Weinshall, all likely written with the help of artificial-intelligence tools. A scan of the text with AI-detection tools (which are not always reliable) produced differing results, with Copyleaks concluding a 100% likelihood of AI-generated content and ZeroGPT displaying a 1.88% match.
As of Nov. 10, the Kienen-Patricia-Natasja Facebook page’s “page transparency” tab listed at least two of its managers as residing in Vietnam. By Nov. 11, that number changed to one page manager in Vietnam. Snopes previously reported many stories about Vietnam-run Facebook pages promoting fabricated, AI-generated stories about celebrities, politics and disasters.
Other Facebook pages also featured the same false story alongside comments featuring links to advertisement-filled blog articles. Those Facebook pages showed page managers residing in Vietnam.
We contacted the Kienen-Patricia-Natasja Facebook page via Messenger to ask its owners about their fabricated content — featuring many other completely fictional stories with writing resembling AI-generated content, as well as AI-generated images of Kennedy — and will update this story if we receive more information.
Digging into the rumor
The fabricated story contained several false or entirely unsubstantiated claims about Ocasio-Cortez and Schumer.
Regarding the $12.4 million net-worth claim, we previously reported on the false rumor that Ocasio-Cortez became a multimillionaire after being elected to Congress.
Searches of Bing, DuckDuckGo, Google and Yahoo located no information about Ocasio-Cortez receiving $4.7 million in “dark money” campaign contributions, nor did searches find details to confirm her mother owned seven rental properties.
One part of the post said Saikat Chakrabarti, Ocasio-Cortez’s former chief of staff, was “fired for funneling $1.2 million to his own LLC.” A search for Chakrabarti’s name found Politico reporting in early August 2019 that he had resigned. A New York Post article also featured some details of an investigation involving Chakrabarti allegedly funneling more than $1 million to two LLCs. In January 2022, the Federal Election Commission dismissed a case involving Chakrabarti after voting 3-3, indicating a failure to find reason to believe he violated a federal election law regarding dollar limits on contributions.
As for Schumer and the claim about an $8.2 million apartment, The New York Times reported he purchased his Park Slope apartment in Brooklyn — not a brownstone — in 1983. Observer.com reported the purchase occurred in 1982, at a cost of $157,000.
Regarding Iris Weinshall, Schumer’s wife, The New York Public Library’s website listed her as its chief operating officer and treasurer. A Google search for “has Iris Weinshall worked for Goldman Sachs” displays a result making it appear as if she truly once worked for the bank and investment company, as the fabricated story claimed. That search result description text read, “Earlier in her career, she worked for Goldman Sachs in the Investment Banking Division.” However, that sentence applied to a different person’s biography on the library website, not Weinshall’s.
This mention of Goldman Sachs appeared in a different person’s biography.
For further reading, we previously investigated other untrue claims about Ocasio-Cortez, including one alleging her brother was arrested after police found him in possession of $1.2 million worth of fentanyl.
