Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has earned praise for her response to a question on trans rights during a town hall hosted by the progressive campus group More Perfect University.
At the organization’s Students vs. Billionaires town hall in Maine on Thursday, a trans student from the University of Southern Maine asked for Ocasio-Cortez’s response to the fact that “a lot of trans people in America feel that we have been abandoned by the Democratic Party, that we are a losing issue, that it’s not worth defending us.”
The woman was referring to the fact that many trans advocates feel some Democrats have missed the mark on trans issues, or in some cases have actively made decisions that hurt the trans community in an attempt to defend themselves against Republican attacks. Since the 2024 election, Democrats have disagreed on the effect of the GOP’s anti-trans ads, with some suggesting the need to throw trans people under the bus in order to win future elections.
Without hesitation, Ocasio-Cortez responded, “They’re wrong.”
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As you point out, the fascists are rounding up immigrants into concentration camps. We keep losing rights by the week. And it didn’t start with trans people? Then why did it get as far as them? So far, we have failed to stop any step in the process. It’s understandable, because when anybody’s rights are contingent rather than inalienable, we can always rationalize why it’s okay to abandon the next group.
Why did it get this far? Because adequate opposition to the fascist takeover does not exist yet, if it ever forms. Fascism will keep moving through undesired and opposition groups until someone forms effective opposition. It isn’t a lack of will or concern, it’s a lack of power.
Progressives have no power in government right now, the courts are complicit with the takeover, the executive, legislative and judicial are all complicit, numerous billionaires are in on it, even foreign geopolitical heavyweights like Vladimir Putin has his hands in how the US government runs and what it does.
What’s happening now may require people to upend their lives and discard their life plans to stop it. They are not ready to do that, or they would have. They may not be capable of doing what is necessary, they may never be. American is in a horrific state across the board.