VOTE FOR/VOTA POR ALEXANDRIA! OCASIO! CORTEZ!

You can get with this, or you can get with that

I think you’ll get with this, for this is where it’s at.

—Black Sheep, “The Choice Is Yours”

WE DID IT. This Bronx girl is running for CONGRESS! ” was the tweet on April 13, 2018, to announce Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s official run for Congress. It was followed with her cab ride to the Board of Elections with more than 5,400 signatures from registered Democrats in New York’s fourteenth District. Her tweet:

AOC was not a traditional candidate, no ma’am, and she was not running a traditional campaign. The people in the 14th District were in awe when suddenly in the windows of bodegas and Laundromats appeared these posters of a young bonita running for Congress. Say whaa? The posters were printed on bright-blue paper in bubble letters with stars and text in both English and Spanish, celebrating her heritage. This doe-eyed young woman with a low bun in her hair gazing toward the sky in a symbolic expression of hope for the future was running against Rep. Joe Crowley, a fifty-six-year-old white guy. Say whaa?

Meanwhile, everyone on the scene knew who Crowley was. He was the House Democratic Caucus chair (which ranked him behind only the conference chair, minority whip, and minority leader in the House caucus), and was being groomed to take on a leadership role as Speaker of the House, as Nancy Pelosi’s successor. Whoa, Queen of the Resistance Pelosi is a fierce act to follow, so this dude must have been substantial, beloved, incredible. Eeek. How was AOC going to win this, sis?

But wait, there’s more. He was a member of the powerful Ways and Means Committee, and an Irish American native New Yorker. Nothing says badass like being a New Yorker, but so was AOC. He had been in Congress for almost twenty years, so there was the esteem and influence, and about half of that time he had been representing the 14th District, and in the last election had won with 74 percent of the vote. Okay, this was . . . an issue. . . . *concerned eyebrows*

The endorsements were also, uh, pretty stacked in his favor. Here’s a “quick” rundown. He was endorsed by many unions, the police, Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice America, and the Women’s Equality Party. He was also endorsed by four state senators and eleven members of the state assembly, the Bronx and Queens borough presidents, seven New York City councilmen, governor of New York Andrew Cuomo, five members of the House representing New York, and three other members of the House. He was endorsed by the Stonewall Democrats, the Human Rights Campaign, and even the Himalayan Democratic Club (what!!!) as well as the Jackson Heights Indian Merchants Association. Dang, the list was straight-up impressive, and it looked like the young newbie should go back home and sit down.

So, sis, how could she have possibly in this lifetime won?

Ooooh, it gets juicy.

First of all, the House was scared and paranoid about new rookies coming in and talking revolutionary ideas like Medicare for All instead of appealing to the white, racist base that had gotten Trump elected and had sent the nation into chaos. Everything would be on the line in 2020, and they did not want to split the Democratic vote, so Crowley had all the help in the world from the Democratic establishment. So, again, how could he lose this race to a twenty-seven-year-old with no experience?

Well, the truth is that despite her opponent’s long résumé, AOC was welcomed by the community like the Temptations’ sunshine on a cloudy day. In 2018, Crowley’s district had the second highest number of foreign-born residents in the state, the third highest number of Latino residents out of the twenty-seven districts in the state, and the fourth highest Asian population. The district was becoming more and more minority-based. Crowley’s long and consistent reign as their representative had helped him maintain political clout, but this growing minority was starting to think, in the words of the queen Janet Jackson, What have you done for me lately?

Crowley was a little out of touch with their version of the American dream—yes, he had grown up in New York but he hadn’t repped a Boogie-Down or Queens lifestyle in ages. It’s like when Jay-Z goes back to Brooklyn. He can send over soundtracks but these days, boo, he’s lunching with David Letterman on My Next Guest and rapping about fine wine, “Y’all [bleep] acting way too tough / Throw on a suit get it tapered up.”

Not that Jay-Z is necessarily out of touch—he’s an evolved king of hip-hop actually—but you get the idea. Crowley had definitely lost his handle on his district. Especially in the divisive times when his largely immigrant community was being portrayed as villains and targeted by the president on a national platform. The subtext of the election gave Alexandria a definite advantage—as a young, working-class woman of color, she looked and sounded like, and not to mention understood, the future of the district.

But beyond this, Crowley decided to run against Trump, instead of running for the people in his district. He invested most of his campaign funds in ads highlighting his anti-Trump agenda. In 2017 he introduced a bill to give citizenship to undocumented workers who’d helped to clean up and recover after 9/11, and was a vocal critic of Trump’s Mexican border wall. He had already started to have small meetings with lawmakers about becoming Speaker, and thought everything was all set for his new seat (though Queen of the Resistance Pelosi was not going anywhere just yet, Crowley. Oh puhlease!). The blinding white male privilege was apparent, though things did seem to be lining up for him. . . .

Except that this time, he had a charismatic challenger. In a sharp contrast to Crowley’s approach, Alexandria’s message to the people of the district was clear. She was one of them. Again, her campaign championed her identity, and in a spirited movie poster–like design, it seemed to unapologetically celebrate being Latinx. Her campaign brand avoided that stale red, white, and blue flag, but she was also filled with some JLo flava, smart, fun, and bold.

Her campaign was multicultural inside and out. She wasn’t cashing in on the optics of diversity. Her heritage wouldn’t be used for the sake of PR. Her hiring reflected the diversity of the boroughs she was running to represent too: her campaign manager and first chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, was Indian; Donnie Whitehead and Jo-Ann Floyd-Whitehead, who helped her on the campaign, were revered longtime African American strategists; and more than one hundred Democratic Socialists of America members volunteered for her campaign, many of whom were white, and this proud Latina got plenty of love from her own community.

By the time she decided to run, the 14th District had become majority-minority and had given Bernie Sanders 41 percent of their vote in the last presidential primary. The political and demographic shift meant Ocasio-Cortez had a chance, despite campaigning against Joe Crowley, a powerful member and a rising star in the Democratic Party.

Remember, Joe Crowley believed that Trump was his prime adversary, but really it was the discontentment of people who were craving fundamental change and some kind of diversity in their representation. When they met the firebrand AOC, she could speak with them in English and Spanish, even if her Spanish was imperfect at times—something she’s been open about and that has resonated with many younger Latinx Americans. She could salsa and would spend time in their homes after work. They knew she cared about the issues that were important to them, and she was there campaigning and trying to win them! Where was he? He was like that uncle who just sends a card with money on holidays because he’s too “busy” to come by the house. Crowley probably wasn’t a bad guy, he was just focused on a scope beyond his constituents. His district was changing yet he was remaining the same. He took his election for granted, spending too much time with the bigwigs in Washington and not enough with the people.

He had the means to win; he raised more than $2 million for his campaign. He was known for his ability to fundraise. AOC started with no real funds, but she was an activist and an organizer. She had only $300,000 in the bank from grassroots door-to-door campaigning; “no corporate backing” was her mantra. Endorsements came from organizations like MoveOn, Democracy for America, and the People for Bernie Sanders. She knocked on doors and sat down in people’s homes. She talked to them about their lives, what was troubling them and what was troubling her about their struggle, you know. Beyond just connecting with her as a candidate who seemed more like them than Crowley was, they began to see her as an advocate who could stand up for them in Congress.

It also didn’t hurt that AOC’s campaign was fun and creative! What? Is that allowed in politics? She organized happy hours in the community. There were photos of her speechwriting on the subway. There was even a documentary being filmed in part about her campaign, Knock Down the House, by Emmy-nominated director Rachel Lears. Not unlike AOC’s campaign, the film was a scrappy, people-powered operation: Lears had started a Kickstarter campaign to fund it.

Those bold, uplifting campaign posters she had? They were donated in-kind from Tandem, a design firm dedicated to using persuasive marketing and advertisement “to advance the greater good.” They have also designed signage for social-justice initiatives, organizations like Planned Parenthood advocating to protect Roe v. Wade. The image on Alexandria’s campaign posters was obviously inspired by Obama’s iconic “HOPE” posters.

And hope was a major part of what kept this little campaign going. Hustling all the way through, AOC knocked on doors and rallied volunteers, keeping the movement humming along, even when the media wasn’t giving her a second thought.

And then there were the debates.

Crowley was called out for being a no-show. Odd, because debates were definitely part of campaigning and winning votes. *side-eye* But this guy was too comfortable. After missing two debates in the primary, he finally sent over a surrogate. Huh? And he certainly made sure that he sent over a Latina in his place, because his opponent was Latina. Isn’t this what diversity looks like? NO!

The event was hosted by Parkchester Times. Crowley said there were scheduling conflicts and he had to attend a civic meeting in Queens instead. That’s why he sent over Annabel Palma, but Parkchester Times had no record of his desire to change the date. It was awkward at best. AOC tweeted that he’d sent, “a woman with a slight resemblance to me.”

As portrayed in Knock Down the House, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez didn’t show up like she owned the place, ready to take down this guy Crowley. There was a little bit of imposter syndrome going on, sis. She’s human. But she just kept showing up. And that’s the cherry on the success sundae. The pep talk she gives herself in the documentary is a mantra all queens can adopt on the rise up—’cause Lord knows a queen needs an anthem. Going big ain’t all rosé, girl, and AOC had to be her own bandleader. “I am experienced enough to do this,” she tells herself. “I am mature enough to do this. I am brave enough to do this.”

She knew that in the debates if Crowley went low—“This whole time, he’s gonna tell me I can’t do this. He’s gonna tell me I’m small, I’m little, that I’m young, that I’m inexperienced.” Well she was going to have to kung-fu block him with that Michelle Obama fire, and go high!

Then, whoa, don’t be fooled by a queen’s moment of weakness, honey, it was a brass-knuckled takedown after that. She was still only twenty-eight years old and basically unknown to him, but she was a boss, sorry he hadn’t known it yet. ’Cause he’d know it once he faced her head-on.

In the debates, he got a taste of her power. She’d shut down his arguments, exploit his weaknesses, and in a live debate on NY1 you would have almost feared for Crowley, the way he was almost sweating and squirming in his seat while this woman tore his argument apart about the US Immigrations Control and Enforcement Agency (ICE) in a passionate rage (bold emphasis added, sis, to show where she smacked that set’s table to underscore her point):

“You know what, if this organization [ICE] is as fascist as you’ve called it . . . Then. why. don’t. you adopt the stance to eliminate it. This. is. a. moral. problem and your response has been to apply more paperwork to this situation. That puts our communities in danger, and it also conveys a profound misunderstanding of how we should be approaching this problem.”

AOC was mad, not necessarily at Crowley himself, but at his politics. He was wasting his constituents’ time while the nation was under attack by white nationalism, along with so many other issues. She was vocalizing what others felt. If Democrats like him were about that life, they needed to be more vocal about what was downright wrong! There was no time for games, or for shallow posturing. She put Crowley on the spot, and he was shut down because he wasn’t ready to live it the way she was.

Her voice against injustice raised a moral dilemma for the Democratic Party that struck at the core of the party’s incapacity to win on the big issues: the lack of acknowledgment that racism was still a major gear driving this country, even when Barack Obama had been in the White House. Democrats did not fight hard enough to protect their own, and with movements on the rise like Black Lives Matter, Me Too, and Time’s Up, people were looking for champions to speak up even to their liberal brethren who weren’t addressing their needs. Crowley had everything an incumbent could ask for to take up that role, but all the institutional power he held was no substitute for that kind of deep connection. Ocasio-Cortez came at him strong and firm. She wasn’t afraid to have a stance, to pull up, and before he could blink, his campaign was cooked.

Less than two weeks later, in the Democratic primary on June 26, 2018, she beat him by fifteen points! The 14th District had so many Democrats (like, seven times more Democrats than Republicans) that winning the primary basically meant winning the seat. She beat him in that primary, and he pledged to support her in November, but he still appeared on the ballot as a third-party candidate under the progressive Working Families Party in the general election! It caused a bit of controversy at the time. C’mon, man. You lost fair and square!

That November, she went on to win the general election against Republican candidate Anthony Pappas with a whopping 78 percent of the vote, and become the youngest woman ever elected to Congress.

WE ALL KNEW she’d win—you picked up this book knowing that, right? But just for fun, let’s go back to that exhilarating summer night. Alexandria and her supporters had gathered at a bar in the Bronx to watch the results roll in. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s name appeared on the television, and then her name just kept popping up on the screen again and again and again. The crowd went wild with proud, loud millennial joy.

She won!

Her performance in Knock Down the House was Oscar-ready, like Sally Field’s “You like me, you really like me!” Except AOC was so shocked that she couldn’t really speak—“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God” was all that could come out as she steadily held her chest surrounded by her tearful supporters. Eventually, she was able to soak it all in, and realized that a speech was needed: “This victory belongs to every grassroots organizer, every working parent, every mom, every member of the LGBTQ community, every single person is responsible for this . . . What we’ve seen is that working-class Americans want a clear champion, and there is nothing radical about moral clarity in 2018.”

Beautiful, right?!

Meanwhile, “SHOCKING” was the unfortunate sentiment on the Hill from our president. Trump tweeted:

Wow! Big Trump Hater Congressman Joe Crowley, who many expected was going to take Nancy Pelosi’s place, just LOST his primary election. In other words, he’s out! That is a big one that nobody saw happening. Perhaps he should have been nicer, and more respectful, to his President!

Ugh, man-babies! WHY MUST EVERYTHING BE ABOUT HIM?!

He couldn’t even let AOC get her reggaeton on before he started tweeting. But her positivity couldn’t be crushed so easily.

When she won the general election that fall, and officially became a congresswoman-elect, AOC used her time to make it a win for us all:

This is what is possible when everyday people come together in the collective realization that all our actions, no matter how small or how large, are powerful, worthwhile and capable of lasting change.

Words cannot express my gratitude to every organizer, every small-dollar donor, every working parent and Dreamer who helped make this movement happen. And that’s exactly what this is—not a campaign or an Election Day but a movement, a larger movement for social, economic and racial justice in the United States of America.

When I started this campaign a year ago, I was working in a restaurant in downtown Manhattan, and it wasn’t because . . . we didn’t launch this campaign because I thought I was special or unique or better than anyone else. We launched this campaign because in the absence of anyone giving a clear voice on the moral issues of our time, then it is up to us to voice them.

We launched this campaign because no one was clearly and authentically talking about issues like the corrupting role of money in politics, about the disturbing human rights violations being committed by ICE, by the fact that we had no one giving voice to the idea and the notion that an entire generation is graduating with crippling loads of student loan debt, a ticking time bomb for our economy.

No one was talking about these issues, and when no one talks about them, we have the duty to stand up for what is right.

I think about oftentimes that incredible day on June 26 when despite no attention, despite no media fanfare, despite the fact that no one wanted for us to get the word out on what was going on, we were able to organize everyday people, knocking on our neighbor’s door and despite being outspent $4 million—18 or 13 to 1—despite the fact that we were running against a tenth-term incumbent, despite the fact that it was our first time running for office, despite the fact that we didn’t have the money, despite the fact that I’m working-class—despite all those things we won.