Author stands by claim Pelosi tried to sabotage AOC's Green New Deal
'The book was drawn from extensive reporting,' author Edward-Isaac Dovere told Fox News
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}EXCLUSIVE – Despite pushback from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office, author Edward-Isaac Dovere is standing by his new book in which he reports that Pelosi tried to sabotage the rollout of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal in 2019.
"The book was drawn from extensive reporting, and as the note on sourcing in the book says, includes over 400 interviews over four years. It's full of private conversations, phone calls and emails which haven't been revealed before – this among them," Dovere told Fox News on Monday after Pelosi's office pushed back against the book.
PELOSI'S OFFICE PUSHES BACK AGAINST REPORT SHE TRIED TO SABOTAGE AOC'S GREEN NEW DEAL LAUNCH
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Pelosi asked Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., to back out of a Green New Deal event with Ocasio-Cortez because Pelosi was "anxious about the new congresswoman's notoriety becoming actual power," according to Dovere's new book, "Battle for the Soul: Inside the Democrats' Campaigns to Defeat Trump," obtained by Fox News.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Sen. Ed Markey (right), D-Mass., speak during a press conference outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 7, 2019. to announce Green New Deal legislation. ((Photo by SAUL LOEB / AFP)Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
"In February 2019, Pelosi called Ed Markey the night before he was scheduled to help roll out the Green New Deal. She asked him to hold off. She wanted more substantive policy. The politics weren't good right then. Don’t give the platform to Ocasio-Cortez, she urged, anxious about the new congresswoman's notoriety becoming actual power," Dovere writes in the book.
"This is false. No such call was made," Pelosi's spokesman Drew Hammill told Fox News regarding the book's claim. He added that Pelosi's team plans to ask Dovere for a correction.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Markey was among the progressives who unveiled Green New Deal legislation in February 2019. Pelosi made headlines in 2019 for downplaying the far-reaching proposal.
"It will be one of several or maybe many suggestions that we receive," Pelosi told Politico at the time. "The green dream or whatever they call it, nobody knows what it is, but they're for it right?"
The 2019 Green New Deal resolution said the U.S. "has historically been responsible for a disproportionate amount of greenhouse gas emissions" and called for the U.S. to take a "leading role in reducing emissions through economic transformation."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}The resolution painted a grim view of present-day America, saying it is "experiencing several related crises," including declining life expectancy, economic stagnation, erosion of worker bargaining power, increasing income inequality and the exacerbation of "systemic racial, regional, social, environmental and economic injustices."
The resolution said that "a new national social, industrial and economic mobilization on a scale not seen since World War II and the New Deal" is an opportunity to tackle systemic injustices of minority groups, create millions of high-wage jobs and "provide unprecedented levels of prosperity and economic security for all people of the United States."
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{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Dovere's book will be published on Tuesday.
Fox News' inquiries to Ocasio-Cortez's and Markey's offices were not returned at the time of publication.
Fox News' Andrew Murray and Adam Shaw contributed to this report.