The congresswoman claims party members ‘took swings’ at her when she was first elected. Now, a dedicated organisation is pleading her to run for president

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.

    • rynn@piefed.socialEnglish
      3·
      47 minutes ago

      She’s supporting Jeffries.

      She’s making a shrewd calculation here and I trust her more than Jeffries.

    • zoloftt@lemmy.world
      6·
      3 hours ago

      I believe you probably mean Speaker of the House. House Majority leader is 2nd to the Speaker?

      Or you do mean majority, either way.

      • schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works
        6·
        3 hours ago

        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.

    • velma@sh.itjust.worksOP
      73·
      5 hours ago

      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.

      • cattywampas@lemmy.world
        13·
        4 hours ago

        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.

      • schipelblorp@sh.itjust.works
        93·
        5 hours ago

        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.

    • Freeposity@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1412·
      4 hours ago

      She doesn’t get to vote for Majority leader. She’s a representative, not a senator.