RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is laughing off "Woke 1." But she's carrying baggage from the 2020 era of cultural progressivism that some Democrats say is an obstacle to a future presidential run.
Why it matters: AOC's pivot to the cultural center — which she began to roll out last week in a high-profile ABC interview by saying, "Woke 1 was crazy" — is potential damage control for her past remarks about law enforcement, immigration and a range of social issues.
Ocasio-Cortez told ABC that the left's so-called excesses of that period were partly the result of the COVID pandemic and lockdowns.
But she made some of her most controversial remarks before the pandemic hit the U.S. in 2020.
"This is really going to be something that handicaps her, especially with demographics that are culturally more moderate," former Biden White House adviser Yemisi Egbewole told us, pointing to Black voters in the South who have a large voice in Democratic presidential primaries.
Flashback: In the early 2020s, Ocasio-Cortez was one of the most aggressive and well-known advocates for "defunding" the police — an idea that polls have long shown is not popular.
In the summer of 2020, she blasted New York City's government for proposing to cut its police department by only $1 billion.
"Defunding police means defunding police," she said then. "It does not mean budget tricks or funny math." She added: "The fight to defund policing continues."
In 2019, AOC posted on social media that "we need to have a real conversation about decarceration & prison abolition in this country."
She said that year that some marginalized groups "have no choice but to riot."
And she said at an event in 2021: "I want to abolish our carceral system that's designed to trap Black and brown men."
On immigration, Ocasio-Cortez sponsored a bill in 2021 and 2023 to decriminalize border crossings. Asked by the New Yorker in 2019 if she would get rid of the Department of Homeland Security, she said : "I think so. I think so."
She repeatedly used language en vogue in elite liberal circles, such as the gender-neutral term "Latinx" in the early 2020s — a word that surveys have found isn't used by the vast majority of Latino Americans.
She used the phrase "menstruating person" in 2021 to be inclusive of the transgender community.
Zoom out: AOC now has shifted her rhetoric but hasn't detailed where she currently stands on many of these politically fraught topics, or what made her change her views on "Woke 1."
Ocasio-Cortez's spokespeople didn't respond to several questions, including what her position is now on defunding the police, whether she supports decriminalizing the border, and if she thinks rioting is sometimes justified.
In her ABC interview, Ocasio-Cortez did say that she doesn't support some Democratic Socialists of America's proposals such as abolishing police and prisons, defunding the Department of Defense and granting amnesty to all immigrants.
The other side: Some Republicans argue that AOC would be a formidable presidential candidate despite her controversial positions in the past.
"To me, she's incredibly dangerous," said GOP pollster Brent Buchanan, noting that AOC has high name recognition and an impressive favorability rating for a nationally known figure who's faced years of attacks.
He shared his polling that shows Ocasio-Cortez is seen favorably by 39% of voters, compared with 42% who view her unfavorably — a rating similar to Secretary of State Marco Rubio's.
Ocasio-Cortez's recent cultural moderation "tells me she's a good politician, because she's doing it now instead of next year," Buchanan added.
Democratic strategist James Carville likewise praised AOC, telling us that "it's always been evident that she's more talented than the rest of them put together," a reference to other members of the "Squad" of House progressives.
Carville said AOC doesn't need to over-explain her changes of heart: "She can say: 'I'm grown,' and people understand that."
Wisconsin's recent gubernatorial primary showed how cultural progressivism can be an albatross for the left — even at a time when economic populism is gaining momentum.
Socialist Francesca Hong lost by just under 4,000 votes after struggling to explain why she previously had called to "cancel Thanksgiving."
AOC declined to endorse Hong — the latest sign of her move to the center.
The big picture: Ocasio-Cortez is far from the only Democratic politician who wants voters to forget about their past cultural positions from the early 2020s.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said last year that "not one person ever in my office has ever used the word Latinx," though he repeatedly did so in 2020.
Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, meanwhile, have walked back their past support for defunding the police.
Axios' Marc Caputo contributed reporting.
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