PARKERSBURG, Iowa (KCRG) – Iowa U.S. Senator Joni Ernst took to social media on Saturday to respond to criticism surrounding remarks made during her town hall on Friday in Parkersburg.

At the town hall, Sen. Ernst defended efforts to rollback, as she called it, benefits for people she said were not supposed to be eligible for Medicaid benefits. That response drew shouting from the crowd including one woman who yelled “people will die”. An exacerbated Ernst gave a sarcastic reply “well we are all going to die”, which drew more angst from the crowd.

At an event later on Friday, Ernst clarified her remarks, calling the reaction hysteria from the left and emphasizing she was not out to cut Medicaid benefits. “We know two things are true: death and taxes,” Ernst said. “And what I’m trying to do is extending tax benefits for hard hard-working Iowans and that we’re preserving Medicaid for those that meet eligibility requirements. We don’t need to see illegal immigrants receiving benefits that should be going to Iowans.

Screenshot of Joni Ernst’s Instagram apology for comments she made Friday in Parkersburg.

In a video she shared on her Instagram story Saturday, Ernst addressed the moment:

“Hello, everyone. I would like to take this opportunity to sincerely apologize for a statement that I made yesterday at my town hall,” she said in the selfie-looking video while outside. “See, I was in the process of answering a question that had been asked by an audience member when a woman who was extremely distraught screamed out from the back corner of the auditorium: ‘People are going to die’. And I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that yes, we are all going to perish from this earth. So I apologize and I’m really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well, but for those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”