Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (1989- ), a Bronx educator, defeated ten-term Congressman Joe Crowley, even though he outspent her ten to one with the help of Wall Street. It is making news even in Mexico and Brazil.
On June 26th 2018 she won the Democratic Party primary for New York’s 14th Congressional District. If she wins the general election in November, which seems likely (it is a Democratic safe seat), she will be the youngest woman ever elected to Congress. She is just 28. She could become senator, governor, president.
New York’s 14th District takes in parts of the Bronx and Queens in New York City. It is a place where Uber drivers, waitresses, and cleaners live – and where the prison on Rikers Island stands. It is 18% White and 50% Latino (mainly Puerto Rican), but has always had a White representative.
Her mother is from Puerto Rico, her father from the Bronx. She comes from a family of groundskeepers and has a degree in economics and international relations from Boston University.
From her campaign ad:
“This race is about people vs. money. We’ve got people, they’ve got money. It’s time we acknowledge that not all Democrats are the same. That a Democrat who takes corporate money, profits off foreclosure, doesn’t live here, doesn’t send his kids to our schools, doesn’t drink our water or breathe our air, cannot possibly represent us.
“What the Bronx and Queens needs is Medicare-for-all, tuition-free public college, a federal jobs guarantee, and criminal justice reform. We can do it now. It doesn’t take a hundred years to do this.
“It takes political courage.
“A New York for the many is possible.
“It’s time for one of us.”
She worked for Bernie Sanders when he ran for president in 2016. It showed her that grass-roots campaigns were still possible. Like Sanders, most of her money comes from small donors and she is unashamedly left-wing. Unlike Sanders she is race conscious.
She belongs to the Democratic Socialists of America, the largest socialist party in the US. Black Lives Matter of Greater New York was an early supporter of hers.
Protest: She took part in the Standing Rock protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline and, earlier this week, the protests at the Mexican border against President Trump’s zero tolerance immigration policy.
Criminal injustice: She understands how public prosecutors are in bed with the police, the trouble with money bail, and how the prison industrial complex profits off of too many people being in prison.
On the Democratic Party:
“What I see is that the Democratic Party takes working class communities for granted, they take people of color for granted and they just assume that we’re going to turn out no matter how bland or half-stepping these proposals are.”
She sees the Latino vote as a sleeping giant.
She says that in a country as rich as the US, everyone should have good education and health care. The reason that sounds like a pipe dream is because of the Reagan, Bush, and Trump tax cuts. #BillionaireLivesMatter.
– Abagond, 2018.
See also:
- Bernie Sanders
- Standing Rock protests
- Trump’s zero tolerance policy
- race conscious
- mass incarceration
- bail
519
Normally I would distrust a New York politician because of the Wall Street game, but not when that politician:
1. Calls herself a democratic socialist
2. Has worked for Bernie Sanders
3. Has worked in education
4. Comes from a poor immigrant family
5. Looks Black or at least non-White
6. Is a woman
7. Is a millennial
8. Has lived in New England
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is clearly not the stereotypical New York power broker who has sold her soul to the Evil Empire. She sounds like she could be the best politician that state has had since Bobby Kennedy. Her mother says she does want to be president!
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The heart and soul of New York bringing a strong pulse back to the salt of the earth.
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“She comes from a family of groundskeepers”
Where on earth did you get that? Her father, now dead, was an architect.
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Is GroundsKeepers like the new way of saying maid, house keeper, dishwashers, janitors etc? I come from that.
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@ M
She said that in an interview. That does not mean her father was necessarily one himself. I notice she says very little directly about her father. What I have gathered is that he had a university degree, had a small business in the South Bronx, doing God knows what, died of cancer circa 2008, and was born in the Bronx. He looks like he might be Puerto Rican, but so do tons of people, so I am not even sure if he is Puerto Rican.
@ TeddyBearDaddy
“Groundskeeper”, at least in this case, means like janitors, building maintenance, landscapers, gardeners, etc. People hired to maintain a property.
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Well, at the end of the day she’s just another politician. I hope those brown Latino immigrants aren’t looking for her to be some kind of savior.
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@ abagond
“Her father, who tragically died from lung cancer in 2008, was an architect and the CEO of Kirschenbaum & Ocasio-Roman Architects, PC, which focused on remodeling and renovations.” The DailyMail
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