America’s youngest Congresswoman in history has been delighting the public with her progressive ideals and snarky comebacks since 2018. I first heard about her just before she was elected to represent New York’s 14th District, and was immediately swept up in the AOC craze. She’s the breath of fresh air this political climate needs!
But don’t take my word for it — these Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez quotes will tell you everything you need to know.
Honestly, you haven’t lived until you’ve witnessed AOC take down corrupt politicians on Twitter. But even outside of the online arena, her passionate advocacy of various causes is utterly inspiring. If you’re not already familiar with her, these quotes will help you gain a better understanding of her history and the things she stands for.
28 Inspiring Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Quotes
Guileless Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Quotes That Will Tell You Exactly Who She Is
1. “I wake up every day, and I’m a Puerto Rican girl from the Bronx. Every single day.”
2. “I was born in a place where your ZIP code determines your destiny.”
3. “My mother cleaned homes and drove school buses, and when my family was on the brink of foreclosure… I started bartending and waitressing.”
4. “I understand the pain of working-class Americans because I have experienced the pain.”
5. “I felt like the only way to effectively run for office is if you had access to a lot of wealth, high social influence, a lot of dynastic power, and I knew that I didn’t have any of that.”
6. “It’s not just that I’m a woman of color running for office. It’s the way that I ran. It’s the way that my identity formed my methods.”
7. “Women like me aren’t supposed to run for office.”
8. “I see people like me, who thought someone like me couldn’t be in politics, now are saying, ‘Oh wait, I don’t need to take money from corporations to run. Maybe I’ll run, too.’”
9. “I’m not running from the left, I’m running from the bottom. I’m running in fierce advocacy for working-class New Yorkers.”
Galvanizing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Quotes About Her Values
10. “Capitalism has not always existed in the world and will not always exist in the world.”
11. “There’s this false notion that you have to separate and choose between issues of class and issues of race. What people do when they say that you need to separate class from the race is that they are really just saying that people of color should come second.”
12. “There is no such thing as talking about class without there being implications of the racial history of the United States. You just can’t do it.”
13. “I believe that every American should have stable, dignified housing; healthcare; education — that the most very basic needs to sustain modern life should be guaranteed in a moral society.”
14. “I just hope that more people will ignore the fatalism of the argument that we are beyond repair. We are not beyond repair. We are never beyond repair.”
15. “A better world is not only possible, it is within our reach. From mutual aid in our communities to solidarity in the streets, the people of New York have already started to reshape our future. It’s time to bring the movement to the voting booth.”
Passionate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Quotes About Her Climate Concerns
16. “There’s no debate as to whether we should continue producing fossil fuels. There’s no debate, we should not. Every single scientific consensus points to that.”
17. “We don’t have time to sit on our hands as our planet burns. For young people, climate change is bigger than election or re-election. It’s life or death.”
18. “Our planet is going to hit disaster if we don’t turn this ship around and so it’s basically like, there’s a scientific consensus that the lives of children are going to be very difficult.”
19. “We are no longer at the point of preventing climate disaster from happening entirely — we are now at the point of minimizing the damage. And as these floods and storms are here, I think more and more people are going to be willing to stand up for themselves.”
20. “The Green New Deal we are proposing will be similar in scale to the mobilization efforts seen in World War II or the Marshall Plan. We must again invest in the development, manufacturing, deployment, and distribution of energy, but this time green energy.”
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Quotes About Democrats, Republicans, and Encouraging Voter Turnout
21. “It’s time to acknowledge that not all Democrats are the same. That a Democrat who takes corporate money, profits off foreclosure, doesn’t live here, doesn’t send his kids to our schools, doesn’t drink our water or breathe our air cannot possibly represent us.”
22. “What I see is that the Democratic Party takes working-class communities for granted. They take people of color for granted, and they just assume that we’re going to turn out no matter how bland or half-stepping these proposals are.”
23. “The Republicans galvanize their base by inciting a lot of fear; they operate on a lot of mythmaking. So we have to have something compelling. We shouldn’t be afraid to be bold.”
24. “We have to stick to the message: ‘What are we proposing to the American people?’ Not, ‘What are we fighting against?’”
25. “People try to identify who is the most likely person to turn out, and what we did is that we changed who turns out. And that changes the whole electorate.”
26. “The biggest hurdle that our communities have is cynicism — saying it’s a done deal, who cares; there’s no point in voting. If we can get somebody to care, it’s a huge victory for the movement and the causes we’re trying to advocate.”
27. “I think it’s a weapon of cynicism to say, ‘Protest doesn’t work. Organizing doesn’t work. Y’all are a bunch of hippies. You know, it doesn’t do anything.’ Because frankly, it’s said out of fear, because it is a potent force for political change.”
28. “The only time we create any kind of substantive change is when we reach out to a disaffected electorate and inspire and motivate them to vote.”
To Conclude
As you can see, AOC is the personification of the phrase “Started from the bottom, now we’re here.” But even though she came from humble beginnings, many people forget that she wasn’t just a waitress before embarking on her political career. She had previously graduated with honors from Boston University with a double major in international relations and economics.
Before winning her seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, she had worked on Bernie Sanders’s campaign in 2016 and participated in many protests over the years.
Now, she works within the system, advocating progressive policies such as Medicare for All and the Green New Deal. I, for one, can’t wait to see her in the Oval Office, but until then, I’ll be happy reading these Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez quotes.
Image Source: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez photo by Mariam Khan andJohn Parkinson
