She’s back! Former “Squad” ally of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Missouri’s former Rep. Cori Bush, is trying to make a comeback into politics by promising to open up more government spending.
Bush, who just launched an election campaign to win back for her old seat, claimed she brought “billions of dollars” home to St. Louis while serving in Congress. However, federal records reviewed by Fox News tell a different story.
“I’m proud to have delivered home over $2 BILLION and counting,” Bush claimed.
But Bush’s campaign submitted an advertisement touting just $41 million in “community project funding since 2021.” The ad ran for a month beginning April 3, 2024, during her last failed campaign. Bush’s team has not responded to requests to explain the 4,778 percent increase.
On Friday, while launching her comeback bid, Bush repeated the claim and said she “brought billions of dollars home directly to our community.”
“St. Louis deserves a leader who is built different,” Bush’s announcement said. “That’s why I’m running to represent Missouri’s 1st District in Congress. We need a fighter who will lower costs, protect our communities, and make life fairer. I’ll be that fighter.”
Federal contract and grant records published by the Departments of Defense and Justice show that a majority of the funding Bush claims credit for came from those agencies—despite her consistently voting against the authorization bills that secured it.
While in Congress, Bush voted against National Defense Authorization funding, which between Feb. 1, 2021, and May 1, 2024, included nearly $49 million in Department of Defense funding for research at Washington University, Saint Louis University and Vandeventer Place Research Foundation, all located in St. Louis. She included that in her unsubstantiated $2 billion claim.
Through National Defense Authorization funding between 2021 and 2024, Missouri’s 1st congressional district also received at least $ 6 million from the Department of Justice to increase police department headcounts, provide overtime pay or purchase new equipment. The district also benefited from nearly $1.29 billion in Defense Department contracts, primarily for missiles, military aircraft and drone purchases with The Boeing Company.
Bush was also one of six Democrats who voted against former President Joe Biden’s $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure spending bill, which passed through Congress in 2021 as the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
Much of the government spending that flowed into Bush’s district during her tenure supported programs at odds with her socialist platform.
A previous fact check by local station KSDK found that the bulk of the funds Bush claimed were not unique to St. Louis, nor were the specific funding decisions steered by her office. Instead, they were made by local elected officials, school boards and public health departments.
Democratic Majority for Israel President Brian Romick criticized Bush’s false claims.
“Cori Bush lied to her constituents last year when she claimed she brought back billions to the district and it’s brazen that instead of owning up to it, she just said it again in her launch video,” Romick said. “Cori Bush lost because she was an ineffective Member of Congress and lies like this only remind the voters of that.”
Bush was first elected to Congress in November 2020, quickly joining the ranks of the progressive “Squad,” including Democratic Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.
The Missouri progressive was reelected in 2022, but she became the second member of the Squad to lose her Democratic primary last year after Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York also lost his seat.
Bush was ousted in the Democratic primary in August 2024 by St. Louis County prosecutor Wesley Bell, a more moderate candidate.
Bell responded to Bush’s comeback announcement by saying St. Louis voters already rendered their verdict.
“But here’s the simple truth: Missouri voters already rendered their verdict when they voted her out of office last year and chose to move on,” Bell said. “St. Louis deserves real results and honest representation, not more headlines or scandals. When it came time to deliver, Cori Bush’s focus wasn’t on our community, but on her own national agenda. That’s why our district was left behind.”