In an interview with The Intercept, New York Democratic Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez expressed frustration with the Democratic Party over its self-hating attitudes, submission to Big Money, corruption, and finally – its “catastrophic performance” in the midterm elections. Ocasio-Cortez even went as far as to demand the head of the New York State Democratic Party, Jay Jacobs, to resign.

Upon being asked whether she thought the Democrats could have done better in the midterms, she noted that there are a number of issues pertaining to the Democrats’ approach in the elections which did more harm than good. One of the issues was policing, where Democrats would “validate” and “amplify” Republican narratives on crime and policing, even running ads on the narratives, which ended up hurting their cause. The key issues included defunding the police, abortion, and more.

The Democrats in New York, according to Ocasio-Cortez, for instance, ran ads that were "explicitly anti-defund", which worked to "really reinforce what Republicans were saying."

Another mistake the Democrats made, she said, was that Andrew Cuomo’s “political machinery” was still intact. She described the political infrastructure he installed in New York as “disorganized” and “sycophantic”; that it relies on lobbyists and Big Money. This undermines the ability for there to be “affirming grassroots- and state-level organizing across the state.” According to Ocasio-Cortez, much of the Republican campaign isn’t as strong as it seems, and it’s merely just “absence” and a “void” left in the political sphere for the Republicans to walk into – a nod to corruption “that has been allowed to continue in the New York State Democratic Party.”

A redistricting ballot measure proposed in 2021 that would have won more Democratic seats this year was blocked by the Republican Party, who, according to Ocasio-Cortez, “put millions of dollars against this ballot measure,” arguing that they “organized against it, and the New York State Democratic Party didn’t drop $1 in making sure that we got this thing passed.”

Democrats fighting progressive

The interviewer then asked the politician what sort of structure is being oriented to replaced the former Cuomo-engineered one.  

Ocasio-Cortez did not put forward a solution, but rather elucidated the structure of the state leadership, explaining "The way the party in NY is currently structured is very reliant on the governor’s seat. She notes that the governor “very much determines who the state party chair is."

“I think that there very much is room for a conversation to be held here about how we can restructure how the party is selected and established in perhaps a more decentralized way, or perhaps in a more democratic way, that is more representative of communities and more encouraging of engagement across the state — and less meddling to be frank,” she said.

She revealed that despite being in Congress for 4 years, she has never had a conversation with the NY Democratic Party chair “ever,” and that the chair has done nothing but attack progressive Democrats all across the state. This fostered a hostile environment for progressives, creating a subcategory of Democrats that the head deems legitimate: A category of “legitimate Democratic candidates worthy of support are those who fight both progressives and Republicans” – which is clearly not a winning strategy, according to the politician.

The head, according to Ocasio-Cortez, “invested so much energy into demoralizing the grassroots and making sure that a lot of this grassroots energy gets busted up all across the state.”

Ocasio-Cortez also slammed the ongoing antagonism and demoralization of progressives in the Democratic party, revealing that there has been “a campaign within the Democratic Party to undermine progressive politics and to try to mischaracterize it as toxic.” Part of this toxic campaign waged against the progressives was their slamming of the CPC letter that encouraged the US to push for negotiations to end the war in Ukraine rather than fueling it further with weapons. Under pressure, that letter was retracted.

Corruption takes up a significant room in the party’s decision-making. Ocasio-Cortez explained that much of the issue of initiatives to flip the infrastructure is driven by Big Money, real estate, and charter lobbies, which all invest hefty amounts of cash into influencing who gets Democratic support and who doesn’t. She argues that there should be a political cost to being backed by Big Money.

The Democrat weighed in on the factors that have contributed to the party's impediment in the midterm elections, while "In contrast, GOP strategists today are arguing that their candidates should have done a much better job given that the exit polls exhibited that 73% of voters were angry with the economic situation in the US."

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