Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has accused establishment Democrats of treating her “like shit” as progressive activists urged her to run for president in 2028.
In a 100-minute long video posted on Instagram, the 37-year-old congresswoman from New York said that the party had a “remarkable opportunity” to pass left-wing policies after the midterm elections. She also accused the party’s leadership of starving funds from left-wing candidates during the campaign.
“There’s this huge conversation about candidates that were under invested in,” Ocasio-Cortez said. She cited Angie Nixon, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America who came within 240,000 votes of flipping Florida from red to blue, but ultimately lost to the Republican candidate Ashley Moody.
“If Angie Nixon had just had a little bit of that support, that outcome could have changed. But that money has to come from somewhere and it comes from these people,” Ocasio-Cortez said in reference to the party’s Senate leadership.
Reflecting on the period after she was first elected to Congress in 2018 at the age of 29, Ocasio-Cortez accused senior Democrats of being “horrifically cruel” to her. “I mean I was treated like shit,” she said. “Everybody took a swing at me.”
The Bronx congresswoman is seen as the likeliest progressive candidate to run for the Democratic nomination for president in 2028.
I remember her speaking about this quite candidly not too long ago (I want to say last year or two but time flies these days) about going into a side room off the House chamber and seeing herself giving an interview on a major outlet, and a fellow Democrat – knowing she was there – just shaking his head at the TV.
That cruelty exemplifies what is wrong with the party, and precisely why the likes of Schumer and Jeffries must go.
She needs to overhaul the party. I kind of lean toward her primarying Schumer, but I am amicable to a 2028 run. Whichever she decides, I’m with her.
If she doesn’t, the best compromise I can see that can viably win is probably Ossoff, which given what he said here I think is generally the right message to carry forward.
Edit: I do think it’s worth pointing out that she of course wouldn’t even be viable under the Republican ticket. That like Sanders, she chooses to caucus with Democrats for good reason. Perfect? No. Better? Undeniably so. On every single issue, frankly.
That said, the 2028 Democratic Primaries are officially on, and it’s time to make Democrats a little more perfect.
I remember Pelosi especially was vicious. AOC didn’t get brave again for a year + after that shit. Great point about Angie, she would have won with minimal support. We need to form a 3rd party, enough is enough.
Of course. Establishment Democrats are anti-labor, and AOC is pro-labor.
The old guard has helped republicans turn this country into a facist shit hole.
Yes. They’re all ratchet democrats who are in it only for the corporate dollars.
It’s “fascist”, and Republicans did that just fine on their own.
Thanks for the spelling correction sweet summer child.
Anyone got a link around the paywall? Or is the whole article in the subtext of the post?
Oh, I didn’t hit the paywall when I had posted! Apologies! I’ll see if I can dig up a version that isn’t behind a paywall
Edit: No luck so far. I’ll keep looking though!
AOC as presidential candidate would prove some interesting things about the voting populus, but it would also bring some interesting things to light about the current state of the power the wealthy hold.
The old DNC could try hard to oppose her. But there isn’t a single Democrat with name recognition on her level.
They can’t argue against her policy stance in a way that people would support a competitor.
They could argue against her age and experience, but I think the voting populace doesn’t give a fuck about that anymore. They could result to other personal attacks like her being Puerto Rican, or a woman.
The GOP would result to scare tactics that, apparently, have finally lost their edge.
What I’m curious about isn’t the stuff we see in the news. Trump and the oligarchs would stop at nothing to prevent her victory. The ultra rich never had nearly as much wealth and power as they do now, and a lot of people conveniently died as they became too popular.
Dems exist to stop leftists. They do it over and over.
That’s a confusing take.
That worked in 2016. That didn’t work in this election. The current DNC chair started his career as an intern working for Paul Wellstone.
Are you suggesting we just do… nothing?
We need to harass our reps until they lose the will to live. Be loud, be annoying and most of all be persistent. Tell them what you want clearly, for example, i don’t want schumer and jeffires in leadership positions, so I’m focusing on that. Also give them an alternate path to vote for, like instead of voting for schumer, please vote for Chris Van Hollen. Then do it again the next day. Phone calls preferably.
I’d personally rather see her jump to the Senate for a term, or NY Governor, before trying for the presidency. I’d say the same for any House rep. Governors and Senators have the clearest parallels to the office, as executive and foreign-policy roles themselves.
I think AOC is a high-variance candidate - much the same way Trump was in 2016 - and she will either get much more or much less support than expected in the general election.
I think her biggest electoral baggage will be her statements over the years on the ‘Woke 1.0’ items that the electorate soured on. She has moderated her past statements here more recently, which leaves a lot of doubt as to her actual beliefs and policy goals. She’ll be attacked for that from the left and the right, and it will take oxygen away from a progressive economic agenda that would likely be broadly popular if explained well.
Whoever the dem candidate ends up being, I doubt they can rely on the same level of support as the party received in the midterms. 2 years is an eternity in politics and 2028 will likely be defined by some new crisis that isn’t even on our radar right now. If she runs, I’ll likely vote for her (at least, based on who else seems to be running as of now).
We simply don’t have time, we’re in need of that once in a generation leader right now and she’s the best we’ve got.
I’d personally rather see her jump to the Senate for a term, or NY Governor, before trying for the presidency. I’d say the same for any House rep. Governors and Senators have the clearest parallels to the office, as executive and foreign-policy roles themselves
only one sitting house rep has been elected president. ONE. garfield, in 1880. a 9-term rep, and at that time he was already chosen by his state legislature to be a senator… so like a ‘senator elect’ today… which he declined when he won his presidential campaign.
We already tried this with Bernie Sanders, the people’s vote don’t matter because the corporations are in danger
Previous losses should not stop us from trying again. The public is shifting. The scenarios are changing in each election cycle.
The public shifted because gas hit $6/gal. I don’t disagree that class consciousness is growing, but I don’t think it’s as prevalent in the real world as it is online. And more importantly, I don’t think the party apparatus of the DNC is remotely ready to hand over power to the progressive wing. They will use their oligarchs’ money to promote right wingers like Newsom.
All valid points. Although I think conservatives are the ones who are only upset by the gas prices. I suspect the rest of the normally disengaged public may have become engaged in the midterms for the litany of other good reasons as well.
Conservatives obviously can’t change, but my hope is that the normal people will continue to become more and more upset during the remaining time Trump has in office.
By November 2028, if we stay on this course, we might be primed for another dramatic shift left which could affect some components of DNC leadership.
Ejecting conservatives from DNC leadership is the real test, in my opinion.
I like your hope and I want to agree with it, but I also am wary of assuming that normal people are even as aware of news and politics as much as we would hope, let alone care enough about it to do something. I know I live in a bubble of people who care, and Lemmy obviously is its own very specific bubble. I don’t want to take for granted that the majority of people align with my worldview.
They didn’t lose the midterms only on gas prices.
Agreed, there were many things that influenced people in a variety of ways, but cost of living is the one big thing that impacts everybody.
The graph of rise in gas prices maps almost perfectly with lost support for the Republicans.
Those two graphs map like 1:1
It’s not the only thing that voters were made about, but it didn’t help Republicans, that’s for sure.
I don’t get the hate for Newsom. From what I’ve seen he’s doing a good job.
He’s a standard corporate Dem that looks out for oligarchs before working people. He recently opposed the ballot measure that would have put a one-time wealth tax on billionaires.
He is fighting against the billionaire tax.
He threw trans people under the bus.
And everyone not in the 0.1%
Not to minimize what he did to us, but to show he’s not only problematic for trans people.
True, true. It was just the first issue that came to mind.
These midterms just proved that numbers are more important than money. It’s not just “possible” to outvote corporate candidates, it should be considered an obligation.
So we should just do nothing
She 100% has my vote.
I love her, but Congress needs to change its makeup first to be all progressive and pass progressive legislations that will turn successful before she has any chance of presidency.
As of right now if she would run I expect she would lose. I think people want to give progressives a chance but likely would still be hesitant until progressives prove themselves.
1/3rd of Democratic voters this election self-identified as democratic socialists. The days when progressive politics were a minor phenomenon are over. Besides, any successful movement needs to keep making swipes at power even if it doesn’t succeed; these moves are part of what legitimizes it and increases its influence.
I’ve literally heard these sentiments my entire life, and progressives keep proving it wrong every time.
The latest was my dad saying, “well of course a progressive could win in New York, but not anywhere else in the country.”
I think the nation has shown multiple times in the past decade that what we really don’t want is another fucking status quo democrat. The country is desperate for change, and if the democrats and people with your sentiment would take their foot off progressives’ necks and stand behind us instead, progressives could actually make this country great (for the first time, btw).
This is exactly why Hillary lost, FWIW. People were tired of establishment dems being in control. They wanted a shakeup. And in response to that, Dems ran the very personification of the establishment. Hillary was the face of everything that people hated about democrats.
As far as the establishment saw it, she had done her time as a good little soldier, paid her dues promptly, sang the party’s songs, danced the party’s dances, and was “owed” the chance at a presidency because of that. Not because she was the best candidate for the people, but because she was the one who best embodied the establishment that Dems wanted to uphold.
Instead, people voted for the candidate who promised exactly what people wanted: A shakeup. Trump wasn’t a good candidate during his first campaign, but he did promise an end to the old status quo. And to a lot of voters, that was the only thing that mattered.
A bit more context on Clinton: The DNC was pretty much broke and their finances were a mess. Clinton came in and cleaned house and raised a bunch of money and basically saved the DNC from total insolvency. In return for saving their asses, her campaign was given a lot of control over the DNC. She had control of finances and hiring and firing.
How did the DNC get in such bad financial shape in the 1st place? Was it just incompetance or was there also fraud? If you’re a high level DNC leader, do you owe Clinton for saving your job or do you owe her for preventing a scandal that could land you in jail?
All this to say, from the outside it looks like “she put in her time, it’s her turn” but from the inside it’s more “we’ve totally fucked up and if we don’t let her take the wheel we will be jobless, disgraced and possibly sued or jailed”
Bruh, Texas just turned blue. Anything is possible rn.
Hey, you should probably pick your head up and look at recent election news you’ve apparently missed completely.
“The Bronx congresswoman” I thought she was from Queens.
From the Bronx, her district spans Bronx Queens and parts of Manhattan.
She was born in the Bronx.
And that’s exactly who I want to see as a leader. Someone who went through the thick of it and came out the other side, with experience and an understanding of the plight of the common people.
She’s great. Amazing, even. So proud of having her in office.
Instagram has videos longer than a minute?
You’re a tough woman! Fight back.
She did, but it took her over a year to shake off how they treated her, especially Pelosi.
That’s quite literally what she’s doing - she’s planning on running for president despite the horrible treatment.
We don’t have enough of her to go around. We also need her to take one of the New York Senate seats. It’s weird how leadership is not only Zionist but also made up of a significant number of people from the New York metro area.
Mamdani is seeding enough people that can jump into that Senate race if AOC runs for president.
For instance I still contend the long play is to have Brad Lander run for Schumer’s seat
And depending on his ambitions I could see Mamdani running for governor of NY in 2030 and one of the NYC DSA reps challenging Gillibrand.
I would vote for Mamdani so hard for governor.
It’s not weird at all, and doesn’t even require conspiracy. Social clubs, sports clubs, religious sites, and schools.
The way the craven privileged bond and form their cliques, and how easy they are to influence during their early stages of teenage “I know everything”, spoiled rich brat version, are neither imaginative nor mysterious.
No matter how badly the chuds try to give their group chats cool names, they’re always either impressionable fucks trying to outrun daddy’s legacy to make their own, or already compromised by generational favor debts.
The most insulting part of Israel’s puppet up the ass of the world’s wealthy white men, is how fucking embarrassingly easy it was to size the fit.
Why do you think all the pro Zionist arguments (or defenses) right now are emotion based? The most common example is “we don’t feel safe without Israel” followed by “objecting to Zionism or Israel is anti-Semitic!”
When I see these people arguing for Israel I just think, “wow, you’re really unhinged and haven’t addressed the argument being brought forth”
I’m so tired of hearing people use “unhinged”. It’s like one day some kid on the schoolyard said it during recess and now the whole fucking school is using it for everything constantly.
Feel free to substitute any of the following: Deranged, demented, psychotic, disturbed, unstable, unbalanced
Why do I think? The same reason every other issue that is not at all divisive in the face of decency is currently an emotional game of feelings over reality: It’s the easiest form of divide and conquer to effect the manipulation over the largest amount of people, which also provides the required length of cognitive dissonance to meet whatever selfish goal the pricks are using it for with very little upkeep after priming.
The rest of the pieces to make it stick are repeated ad nauseam on Lemmy by many comrades, many whom I would say I vehemently disagree on further finer points, but that’s the crux of it.
Capitalism is not human, and it does not lend itself to engendering human responses to human problems.
Who is she planning to vote for Majority Leader?
She’s supporting Jeffries.
She’s making a shrewd calculation here and I trust her more than Jeffries.
I believe you probably mean Speaker of the House. House Majority leader is 2nd to the Speaker?
Or you do mean majority, either way.
It looks like there’s some ambiguity between the House Speaker and Majority Leader roles.
In the House of Representatives the majority leader’s presence and power often depends on the session. In some sessions, the majority leader takes precedence over the speaker as House leader and legislative party leader either by force (which usually occurs when the speaker of the House is unpopular) or because the speaker of the House voluntarily surrenders power to the majority leader. In most sessions, the speaker of the House takes precedence as house leader and party leader, with the majority leader being irrelevant and largely powerless outside the fact they might be speaker of the House one day. Except, of course, for the fact that the majority leader (as well as the speaker and the minority leader) are the only members of the House that can speak on the floor for an unlimited amount of time and cannot be interrupted by the chair.
Love how byzantine it all is…
Team White vs Team Leek Green, hippodrome Championship 2028! Buy tickets now!
There were rumors a month ago that she would run against Schumer. I don’t think it’s AOC you have to worry about there, but we’ll see.
She may run against Schumer, but in the next Democratic primary election for Senator
She’s in the House, not the Senate. She can neither run nor vote for majority leader, and she has already said she can’t/won’t run for Speaker.
I don’t think she would be a particularly good Speaker of the House anyway. I like her, but that role is not her political strength.
I was just pointing out that all signs indicate she doesn’t support Schumer being reelected.
I agree. I am warming up to the idea of her as president though.
What? You said she might run against Schumer, who is in a different house of Congress. He’s a Senator. She’s a Representative.
Yes, there were rumors months ago that AOC might run for Senate against Schumer.
AOC refuses to rule out run against Senate leader Chuck Schumer
I imagine it would be hard for her to vote for Schumer since she’s in the House, but I read that she did some horse trading with Jeffries so might feel obligated to support him… I think if she wants to maintain her leadership of the progressive wing of the party–which is the real source of her power–she’s going to have to abandon that sinking ship.
I believe she’s smarter than to support Jeffries and Schumer with the way the winds are blowing right now.
I agree. The time to come at the king is now.
She doesn’t get to vote for Majority leader. She’s a representative, not a senator.
The House and the Senate each have a majority leader, refered to as the House Majority Leader and the Senate Majority Leader, AFAIK.
You are wrong. You could look it up, you know.
I think you might want to re-adjust your confidence level.
True, but it also says:
In most sessions, the speaker of the House takes precedence as house leader and party leader, with the majority leader being irrelevant and largely powerless outside the fact they might be speaker of the House one day.
This is why most people doesn’t know it. It seems like it is just a good trivia fact.
This article has multiple issues.
Indeed it does. But this is not one of them.
Thanks.
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or incredibly stupid.
Or simply mistaken, friend.
This took me 5 seconds:
I hate how so many progressives are calling for AOC to run for President in 2028. If she wins and has a Democrat-controlled senate, she’ll still have Schumer as as blocker. If she primaries Schumer and is successful, a huge obstacle to progressivism is removed and a progressive Senator is installed. While that doesn’t guarantee that the Senate would be led by a Progressive, it puts senators like Warren, Wyden, and Merkley in the running.
She could also stay there for 6-18 years, building the political capital to make a very strong run for President, and let more of the generational shift happen first. I personally think that a run in 2036 or 2044 would be a better target for her.
Since Presidents historically come out of Governor’s or Senate offices, I think this would be the best way for her to make a successful run.
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America is far too sexist to elect a female president.
Do you think America is uniquely sexist? Is the USA more sexist than Mexico, South Korea, India, or any other place that elected women leaders?
There is no doubt that sexism is an obstacle to overcome, but I do not think it is an insurmountable one. Sure, being a woman was a roadblock for Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris, but their gender was not a significant reason why those neoliberal candidates lost.
I think that’s the easy way out here. I think America rejected corporate-backed Democrats. AOC is not like Harris or Clinton and it’s a shame that only her gender is being held up here.
Yeah, but the alternative was Trump. Trump was chosen over a woman, TWICE, when Trump lost he was against a man who was just as corporate-backed as the women.
I don’t think it came down to people voting for a man over a woman across the board. This is a really myopic view of the situation when it’s much, much more complicated than that.
Thank you for calling it out, it gets so tiring with these “literally everything is sexism” trolls…
Mhm, I have you tagged a particular way. I’m not going to play into this comment from you at all. There is a lot of sexism that goes hand in hand with politics.
Recall that initially, Kamela Harris was polling far above Trump.
Only once she turned blue dog did he catch up and start leading.
TWICE, when Trump lost he was against a man who was just as corporate-backed as the women.
Context matters here. Biden had two things going for him that neither Harris nor Hillary did:
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He adopted (some) progressive policy and publicly ran on it. After winning the primary Biden basically pilfered Bernie’s platform because he knew it was a winning platform. That’s a far cry from Harris’s “nothing will fundamentally change” shtick. Speaking of Harris, according to exit polling being tougher on Israel would’ve gotten her the votes she needed to win, so she basically did it to herself (and all of us).
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Biden ran in the middle of COVID-19. According to exit polling COVID recovery was the most important issue for about 1/6th of the electorate and those people overwhelmingly voted blue because Trump was unwilling to handle it like an adult. Without those votes Biden absolutely would’ve lost; people whose top issue was the economy overwhelmingly voted for Trump.
2.5. Biden’s margin was tight. It’s not like he pulled off a landslide victory, so even if the difference was attributable to gender it’s far from insurmountable.
Besides, if even MAGAts can elect women reps and the like, it’s really hard to believe gender is such an important issue for the American electorate. If it was we should also expect to see it in some kind of polling or other quantitative evidence. As it stands the gender hypothesis neither has any strong evidence for it nor does it explain most of the available evidence.
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People who cry sexism about everything are incapable of nuance, literally everything is understood and filtered through that single lens. It’s so lazy, no further reasoning required, and if you argue the point, well then you’re sexist too.
Sexism is definitely a factor and the left isn’t immune from it either.
I think if Harris had kicked Trump in the nuts by calling him a traitor and a pedo, and promised medicare for all she would have won.
Where are you drawing this conclusion from?
Our persistent and prevalent rape culture probably. There is a lot of sexism in the US. It was certainly a factor, it just wasn’t the only one. I also believe that we are absolutely capable of electing a woman to the presidency.
Democrats are being the pro-neoliberal that they are? Shocking.
Couldn’t be that bad, she still runs under their party.
