MEAWW.COM / NEWS / HUMAN INTEREST

What is 'AC or AOC'? Blaire Erskine's joke on Texas power outage wins Internet

Erskine satire showed her acting as a spokesperson for ERCOT, urging Texans to unplug this summer to preserve power with a hilarious take

Comedian Blaire Erskine is winning hearts, yet again, after her latest hilarious video. This time, Erskine mixed an important public message in with her comedy, urging Texans to preserve electricity and help save the power grid. She even had an 'ERCOT spokesperson' tag on the video, much to some people's delight and other's concerns. 

As summer approaches, there is concern that Texas' power grid, run by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) will be unable to cope with the spike in demand. Those concerns were already seen last winter when millions of Texans were left freezing after the power grid went down. The lack of power led to numerous deaths, with many families suing ERCOT. Eventually, Governor Greg Abbott ordered an investigation after the massive failure left the state red-faced. 

RELATED ARTICLES

Who is Bill Magness? Texas power grid CEO fired after 6 ERCOT board members step down over winter storm outages

Did Joe Biden block Texas from increasing power capacity before storm? Experts call far-right claims 'false'

Naturally, conservatives rushed to defend Abbott and the government, blaming the failure on the Green New Deal. Erskine's short video was a throwback to those claims when she said Texans would have to choose between ACs and AOC, referring to Rep Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, a strong proponent for the Green New Deal. 

'AC or AOC?' Erskine asks Texas

Erskine uploaded the viral video to Twitter on June 14. "We gotta take care of it (the power grid), or its gonna go bust" she opened. "We can't be having that, it'll be a mess." Erskine is heard saying in the video, "we're just asking the people of Texas to make small sacrifices, no blood or anything like that." She then asked Texans, "would you rather have AC, or AOC? Think about that for a little bit and it will start to make sense."

Erskine concluded by urging Texans to unplug when possible, saying, "If you don't unplug, God's gonna find a way to make you unplug." She then joked, "In this scenario, we are God." That appeared to be a subtle dig at ERCOT's failure in the winter, which led to numerous deaths. We've linked the whole video for you to enjoy below.

Line is 'guaranteed to be used in Republican ads'

"Only @blaireerskine could get AC or AOC trending ..." joked one Twitter user. Another noted, "Blaire is hilarious but AC or AOC is trending because people believe this is real. Amazing." Another user noted, "'It's either AC or AOC.' omfg Had I know it was this easy to put so much fear into the hearts of the right I would have already made a bunch of videos like this one for gasoline and meat."

"Um, y'all, this is a parody...and the fact that so many apparently think it's legit shows how genius it is..." one person observed. Another said, "The AC or AOC hashtag is worth checking out." 

One person trolled, "Blaire Erskine nails the stupidity of Texas again! 'AC or AOC' 'in this scenario, we are God'." Another said, "'Would you rather have AC or AOC?' That line is guaranteed to be used in untold numbers of (R) ads for 2022."

It appears as if a lot of Texans actually believed Erskine was an actual spokesperson for ERCOT. In fact, the concern appeared so widespread, Snopes had to put out an article confirming that it was just a comedic bit, and not an actual line from ERCOT. Nonetheless, it appears as if Erskine's message has got through to Texans, with an extremely hot summer expected this year.