Conservatives are increasingly fixated on Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the young Democratic congresswoman from New York, with Donald Trump and his allies using her as a rallying point for their base. At a recent rally in Michigan, Donald Trump Jr described her rise as “pretty scary”, prompting chants of “AOC sucks!” from the crowd. The obsession was also evident at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where a cardboard cut-out of Ocasio-Cortez featured at an after-party.
Ocasio-Cortez has become a central figure in Republican attacks, with a recent ad in North Carolina warning against her Green New Deal. Fox News has mentioned her 299 times in two weeks, leading the congresswoman to complain that the network has turned into “AOC TMZ”. Sean Hannity has called her “the new leader of the Democratic party” pushing “bizarre, far-left radical ideas”.
Conservative commentator Charlie Sykes noted that Trump “always needs a foil” and that Ocasio-Cortez serves that purpose perfectly. “Republicans would love to make her the face of the Democratic party,” he said, adding that it plays into Trump’s strategy of characterising Democrats as radical socialists. The New York Post, also owned by Rupert Murdoch, published 24 articles about Ocasio-Cortez in six days.
Kurt Bardella, a former Republican adviser, suggested that the fixation stems from a need for a new target after Hillary Clinton. “Here is someone who has become the most visible figure in Congress in a short space of time,” he said. “She is bombastic. This is a millennial female minority, the three things the Fox News audience seem to fear the most.”
