Open socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) has refused to say if she will join the effort to oust House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) from leadership after the 2022 mid-terms.
In an interview with the New Yorker, Ocasio-Cortez was asked whether Nancy Pelosi should stay on as Speaker. The congresswoman said that the moment is too “delicate” to decide if the time is right for Nancy Pelosi to be ousted:
It’s really all about a specific moment that we’re in. We are in such a delicate moment of the day-to-day, particularly with the threats to our democracy. I believe that, at the end of the day, there’s going to be a generational change in our leadership. That is just a simple fact. Now, when that particular moment happens? I think it’s a larger question of conditions and circumstance.
“You don’t want to go near this one,” the interviewer interjected.
“It’s a tough question. It’s not even just a question of the Speaker. It’s a question of our caucus,” she responded. “I wish the Democratic Party had more stones. I wish our party was capable of truly supporting bold leadership that can address root causes.”
When asked if the Democrats had a leadership problem or were simply following public opinion on core progressive issues like “defund the police,” AOC blamed leadership for being “reactive to public discourse.”
I still am disappointed in leadership and in my colleagues, because, ultimately, these conversations about “defund,” or this, that, and the other, are what is happening in public and popular conversations. Our job is to be able to engage in that conversation, to read what is happening, and to be able to develop a vision and translate it into a course of action.
All too often, I believe that a lot of our decisions are reactive to public discourse instead of responsive to public discourse. And so, just because there was this large conversation about “defund the police” coming from the streets, the response was to immediately respond to it with fear, with pooh-poohing, with “this isn’t us,” with arm’s distance. So, then, what is the vision? That’s where I think the Party struggles.
Former Democrat presidential candidate Marianne Williamson accused AOC of performing “double-speak” by not committing to ousting Nancy Pelosi.
“There are many times when I really appreciate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but this is not one of them,” Williamson told Status Coup co-founder Jordan Chariton on Tuesday. “That was such bulls—. That was such to doublespeak.”
Nancy Pelosi announced her run for reelection last month and did not say whether or not she will once again seek to become House Speaker if her party retains the majority in the coming mid-terms. Her run for reelection comes after she broke her promise to Democrats to bow out after her party took control of Congress in 2018.
While we have made progress much more needs to be done to improve people’s lives. This election is crucial: nothing less is at stake than our Democracy.
But we don’t agonize-we organize. I am running for re-election to Congress to deliver For The People and defend Democracy. -NP pic.twitter.com/ojwFPOdRs3
— Nancy Pelosi (@TeamPelosi) January 25, 2022
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/02/16/aoc-will-not-commit-to-voting-against-nancy-pelosi-as-house-speaker/