Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) fumed at her colleagues in an interview over the weekend after her far-left wing of the party was blamed for stunning losses in House races in last week’s elections.
“We know that race is a problem, and avoiding it is not going to solve any electoral issues,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “We have to actively disarm the potent influence of racism at the polls.”
Ocasio-Cortez claimed that the Green New Deal — a socialist agenda that was so toxic that not a single Democrat senator voted to support it when it was put to a vote last year — was “not a sinker” for candidates. Ocasio-Cortez also claimed that “progressive policies do not hurt candidates,” despite the fact that her colleagues said that they nearly lost their own races because of those policies.
“We need to not ever use the word ‘socialist’ or ‘socialism’ ever again. . . . We lost good members because of that,” Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA), who narrowly leads in her reelection bid, said in an audio recording obtained by The Washington Post. “If we are classifying Tuesday as a success . . . we will get f—ing torn apart in 2022.”
Ocasio-Cortez, who has only been an elected official for two years, fumed that other Democrats pointed their fingers at her and her far-left cohorts, suggesting that they were incompetent and did not know how to run campaigns. She also suggested that they needed to spend more money on Facebook, a platform she has repeatedly criticized.
Ocasio-Cortez also said in the interview that she and her far-left cohorts were essentially laughing at Democrats who were “trying to blame the Movement for Black Lives for their loss.” “The Movement for Black Lives” is a fringe coalition of Black Lives Matter groups that support extreme policies. The organization changed some of the things that it listed on its “about” page. Here was what was originally listed on it:
We are Abolitionist:
We believe that prisons, police and all other institutions that inflict violence on Black people must be abolished and replaced by institutions that value and affirm the flourishing of Black lives.
We believe in centering the experiences and leadership of the most marginalized Black people, including but not limited to those who are trans and queer, women and femmes, currently and formerly incarcerated, immigrants, disabled, working class, and poor.
We believe in transformation and a radical realignment of power:
The current systems we live inside of need to be radically transformed, which includes a realignment of global power. We are creating a proactive, movement-based vision instead of a reactionary one.
…
We are anti-capitalist:
We believe and understand that Black people will never achieve liberation under the current global racialized capitalist system.
When asked what surprised her about the election results, Ocasio-Cortez responded: “The share of white support for Trump. I thought the polling was off, but just seeing it, there was that feeling of realizing what work we have to do.”
“We need to do a lot of anti-racist, deep canvassing in this country,” she continued. “Because if we keep losing white shares and just allowing Facebook to radicalize more and more elements of white voters and the white electorate, there’s no amount of people of color and young people that you can turn out to offset that.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s statement was factually incomplete, as President Donald Trump actually lost support with white men while gaining support with every other demographic. Ocasio-Cortez also suggested on Twitter that people who were attacking Democrats by pointing out their support for “Defund” and “Socialism” were racist, calling the attacks “racial resentment attacks.”
So the whole “progressivism is bad” argument just doesn’t have any compelling evidence that I’ve seen.
When it comes to “Defund” & “Socialism” attacks, people need to realize these are racial resentment attacks. You’re not gonna make that go away. You can make it less effective.
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) November 6, 2020
During the interview, Ocasio-Cortez added that she has been “begging the party to let” her help them, and they are not interested in her help, which she claims is the reason that they are losing.
“I offered to help every single swing district Democrat with their operation,” she claimed. “And every single one of them, but five, refused my help. And all five of the vulnerable or swing district people that I helped secured victory or are on a path to secure victory. And every single one that rejected my help is losing. And now they’re blaming us for their loss.”
She said that her far-left policy objectives are “not the enemy” of other Democrats and claimed that if Democrats don’t embrace those views, then “they’re just setting up their own obsolescence.”
Ocasio-Cortez said that she wasn’t even sure if she wanted to be in politics anymore because of how vicious it is and that she considered not running for reelection.
“I don’t even know if I want to be in politics. You know, for real, in the first six months of my term, I didn’t even know if I was going to run for re-election this year,” she said. “But I’m serious when I tell people the odds of me running for higher office and the odds of me just going off trying to start a homestead somewhere — they’re probably the same.”
Ocasio-Cortez has previously claimed that people should consider not reproducing because of climate change, adding that her “dreams of motherhood now taste bittersweet because of what I know about our children’s future.”