Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (/oʊˌkɑːsioʊ kɔːrˈtɛz/ ⓘ oh-KAH-see-oh kor-TEZ, Spanish: [aleɣˈsandɾja oˈkasjo koɾˈtes]; born October 13, 1989), also known by her initials AOC, is an American left-wing politician and activist. She has served as the U.S. representative for New York's 14th congressional district since 2019, as a member of the Democratic Party.
"AOC" redirects here. For other uses, see AOC (disambiguation).
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
October 13, 1989
New York City, U.S.
Riley Roberts (2009–present; engaged 2022)
On June 26, 2018, Ocasio-Cortez drew national recognition when she won the Democratic Party's primary election for New York's 14th congressional district. She defeated Democratic Caucus Chair Joe Crowley, a 10-term incumbent, in what was widely seen as the biggest upset victory in the 2018 midterm election primaries.[3][4][5] She easily won the November general election, defeating Republican Anthony Pappas. She was reelected in the 2020 and 2022 elections.
Taking office at age 29, Ocasio-Cortez is the youngest woman ever to serve in the United States Congress.[6][7] She has been noted for her substantial social media presence relative to her fellow members of Congress.[8] Ocasio-Cortez attended Boston University, where she double-majored in international relations and economics, graduating cum laude. She was previously an activist and worked as a waitress and bartender before running for Congress in 2018.
Alongside Rashida Tlaib, Ocasio-Cortez was the first female member of the Democratic Socialists of America elected to serve in Congress.[9][10] She advocates a progressive platform that includes support for workplace democracy,[11] Medicare for All, tuition-free public college, a federal jobs guarantee, a Green New Deal, and abolishing the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Early life and education
Ocasio-Cortez was born in the New York City borough of the Bronx on October 13, 1989, the daughter of Sergio Ocasio-Roman and Blanca Ocasio-Cortez (née Cortez).[12] She has a younger brother named Gabriel.[13] Her father was born in the Bronx to a Puerto Rican family and became an architect; her mother was born in Puerto Rico.[14][15][16] Ocasio-Cortez lived with her family in an apartment in the Bronx neighborhood of Parkchester[15] until she was five, when the family moved to a house in suburban Yorktown Heights.[15][17]
Ocasio-Cortez attended Yorktown High School, graduating in 2007.[18] In high school and college, Ocasio-Cortez went by the name of "Sandy Ocasio".[19] She came in second in the microbiology category of the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in 2007 with a research project on the effect of antioxidants on the lifespan of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans.[20][21] In a show of appreciation for her efforts, the MIT Lincoln Laboratory named a small asteroid after her: 23238 Ocasio-Cortez.[22][23] In high school, she took part in the National Hispanic Institute's Lorenzo de Zavala (LDZ) Youth Legislative Session. She later became the LDZ Secretary of State while she attended Boston University. Ocasio-Cortez had a John F. Lopez Fellowship.[24]
After graduating from high school, Ocasio-Cortez enrolled at Boston University. Her father died of lung cancer in 2008 during her second year,[25][26] and Ocasio-Cortez became involved in a lengthy probate dispute to settle his estate. She has said that the experience helped her learn "first-hand how attorneys appointed by the court to administer an estate can enrich themselves at the expense of the families struggling to make sense of the bureaucracy".[27] During college, Ocasio-Cortez was an intern for U.S. senator Ted Kennedy in his section on foreign affairs and immigration issues.[28] In interviews, she claimed to have been the only Spanish speaker in the office and the sole person responsible for assisting Spanish-speaking constituents.[28][29][30] Ocasio-Cortez graduated cum laude[31] from Boston University in 2011 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in both international relations and economics.[32][29][33]
Early career
After college, Ocasio-Cortez moved back to the Bronx and took a job as a bartender and waitress to help her mother—a house cleaner and school bus driver—fight foreclosure of their home.[34][35] She later launched Brook Avenue Press, a now-defunct publishing firm for books that portrayed the Bronx in a positive light.[36][37] Ocasio-Cortez also worked for the nonprofit National Hispanic Institute.[24][38][39]
During the 2016 primary, Ocasio-Cortez worked as an organizer for Bernie Sanders's presidential campaign.[40] After the general election, she traveled across America by car, visiting places such as Flint, Michigan, and Standing Rock Indian Reservation in North Dakota, and speaking to people affected by the Flint water crisis and the Dakota Access Pipeline.[41] In an interview she recalled her December 2016 visit to Standing Rock as a tipping point, saying that before that, she had believed that the only way to run for office effectively was to have access to wealth, social influence, and power. But her visit to North Dakota, where she saw others "putting their whole lives and everything that they had on the line for the protection of their community", inspired her to begin to work for her own community.[42] One day after she visited North Dakota, she got a phone call from Brand New Congress, which was recruiting progressive candidates (her brother had nominated her soon after Election Day 2016).[43] She has credited Jabari Brisport's unsuccessful City Council campaign with restoring her belief in electoral politics, in running as a socialist candidate, and in Democratic Socialists of America as an organization.[44]
Political endorsements
Ocasio-Cortez endorsed Bernie Sanders in the 2020 presidential election and appeared with him at speaking engagements. Campaign rallies she attended with him drew the largest crowds of any presidential rally. On January 25, she joined Michael Moore to fill in for Sanders at a rally at the University of Iowa while Sanders was attending the Senate's Trump impeachment trial.[340][341]
In January 2020, Ocasio-Cortez announced the formation of a PAC called Courage to Change,[342] which announced its first endorsements of progressive Democrats on February 21, 2020.[343] Some progressive commentators subsequently criticized Ocasio-Cortez for having only endorsed two Democratic primary challengers by March 3. A notable omission was Cori Bush, who had received an endorsement from Ocasio-Cortez two years prior.[344]
In July 2023, Ocasio-Cortez endorsed President Joe Biden in his reelection campaign in the 2024 presidential election.[345]
Awards and honors
The MIT Lincoln Laboratory named the asteroid 23238 Ocasio-Cortez after her when she was a senior in high school in recognition of her second-place finish in the 2007 Intel International Science and Engineering Fair.[22][23] Ocasio-Cortez was named the 2017 National Hispanic Institute Person of the Year by Ernesto Nieto.[24] In 2019, Ocasio-Cortez received the Adelle Foley Award.[347] She was named as one of the 2019 BBC 100 Women.[348]
Personal life
After the death of Ocasio-Cortez's father in 2008, her mother and grandmother moved to Florida due to financial hardship.[14][34] She still has family in Puerto Rico, where her grandfather was living in a nursing home[301] before he died in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.[349] Ocasio-Cortez said that "to be Puerto Rican is to be the descendant of ... African Moors [and] slaves, Taino Indians, Spanish colonizers, Jewish refugees, and likely others. We are all of these things and something else all at once—we are Boricua."[16]
Ocasio-Cortez is a Catholic. She discussed her faith and its impact on her life and her campaign for criminal justice reform in an article she wrote for America, the magazine of the Jesuit order in the United States.[350] She said she has some Sephardic Jewish ancestry.[351]
During the 2018 election campaign, Ocasio-Cortez resided in Parkchester, Bronx, with her partner, web developer Riley Roberts.[352][353][354] They became engaged in April 2022 in Puerto Rico.[355]
OpenSecrets, analyzing financial disclosure forms, ranked Ocasio-Cortez one of the least wealthy members of the 116th Congress, with a maximum net worth of $30,000.[356]
In May 2021, Ocasio-Cortez said that she had been in psychotherapy after the January 6 United States Capitol attack, which she called "extraordinarily traumatizing", saying she "did not know if I was going to make it to the end of that day alive".[357]
Ocasio-Cortez is a fan of the New York Yankees.[358]