AOC rebuffs notion she is ‘extreme,’ says she’s less out of step than Marjorie Taylor Greene
Ryan King
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Liberal Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) shrugged off suggestions that she is extreme while dinging Republicans for harboring radicals.
Acknowledging that detractors chastise her advocacy for heavy social spending as extreme, Ocasio-Cortez insisted her views were far less out of step with the political center than those of firebrand Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).
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“As someone who is often, I think, characterized as extreme. I, of course, would object to that — I do not believe that I am as extreme in the way that Marjorie Taylor Greene on the Republican side is extreme,” she told CNN’s Chris Wallace.
Wallace pressed the congresswoman on whether the midterm elections showed that people long for both political parties to shift from the poles back to the center.
“I think a lot of people in this country may say ‘yes,’ but it’s important for us to dig into the substance of what that actually means,” Ocasio-Cortez replied.
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Ocasio-Cortez is a member of the “Squad,” a group of liberal House Democrats, many of whom have described themselves as “democratic socialists.”
“The idea that there is an equating of believing in someone who believes in guaranteed universal healthcare in the United States with someone who believes that undocumented people should incur physical harm are somehow in the same level of extreme is something that I would object to,” Ocasio-Cortez added.
The 33-year-old congresswoman from New York has frequently harnessed her socialist bona fides, amplifying the Green New Deal energy policy that calls for bold action to forestall climate change as well as a single-payer healthcare system. She was an enthusiastic backer of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) during both of his presidential primaries.
Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, is considered the most liberal member of the Senate. Ocasio-Cortez similarly skews toward the left of the House Democratic Caucus, though she is not ranked the most left-leaning of the bunch, according to GovTrack.
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In addition to rebuffing the “extreme” label, Ocasio-Cortez also conveyed that she often fears for her personal safety due to her high political profile and the fierce opposition she has attracted.
“Absolutely, I felt that my life has been in danger. Since the moment that I won my primary election in 2018. And it became especially intensified when I was first brought into Congress in 2019,” she explained. “When I wake up in the morning, I hesitate to walk my dog. It means when I come home, I have to ask my fiancee to come out to where my car is to walk me.”