Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-V.T. wasn’t the only progressive politician who came crashing down to earth on Super Tuesday.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. came plummeting with him in a wake up call that saw progressive politics take a major hit.
A trio of candidates supported by AOC all lost in their respective congressional primary races.
Jessica Cisneros, Christina Tzintzún Ramirez and Georgette Gomez all had AOC’s stamp of approval heading into the elections, hopeful they could replicate the same results that the liberal firebrand achieved in 2018.
But all three — in facing off against establishment Democrats — lost.
Following the results Ocasio-Cortez took to Twitter to congratulate her proteges and keep spirits high. She acknowledged both Cisneros, an immigration lawyer running for a congressional seat in Texas, and Ramirez, who ran for Senate is the same state.
According to Fox News, Ocasio-Cortez’ political action committee (PAC) Courage to Change officially endorsed the three candidates, but the support wasn’t enough. The PAC as a whole is designed to help progressive candidates vie for establishment incumbent seats, Fox writes, though the strong fundraising numbers failed to bring the voters out.
“In Texas especially, only 16 percent of voters were 18-29 years old,” Fox writer James Levinson explained, “compared to voters who were 65 or older who made up 24 percent of the vote. Youth voter turnout was only 13 percent nationally.”
On both the federal and local level, the continuous trend of the youths’ absence at the polls defined Super Tuesday results — sinking Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez.
The Bronx, New York native has been no stranger to pushing progressive primary challengers with hopes of knocking off establishment Democratic incumbents.
Since her entrance into the House, she has caused a stir on more than one occasion for what many experts have described as targeting fellow Democratic congressional seats, should she deem them too moderate for her liking.
Ocasio-Cortez told Newsweek in 2019: “I think that who we are as a party in safe blue seats, in deep blue seats, need to embody our stances. And so, I don’t think it’s disrupting or a threat to party unity to ask us to uphold our values, what’s in our charter, what’s in our platform.”
The Horn editorial team