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• Ocasio Cortez Biography

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s upbringing in suburban Westchester County was part of a social media tiff between the congresswoman and former National Rifle Association spokeswoman Dana Loesch.

Ocasio-Cortez's life hasn't been all smooth sailing. She was born in the Bronx where 'your zip code determines your destiny,' Ocasio-Cortez said of the city in her campaign video.Her father ran a. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (also known by her initials AOC) is a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives. In 2018, with little financial backing, she ran an insurgent progressive campaign to win the Democratic Primary for her local district. Since her election, Ocasio-Cortez has become one of the leading progressive voices in America. She supports.

The fight was sparked on Twitter after AOC, who lived and went to school in Yorktown, attributed a spike in New York City crime to poverty and economic uncertainty brought on by the coronavirus shutdown.

The website The Hill posted a video of AOC in which she said police budgets had less to do with crime than poverty and a lack of social and education resources.

“Republicans are all upset that I’m connecting the dots between poverty and crime,” the 30-year-old congresswoman tweeted when sharing the video Monday. “I know most of them haven’t experienced or seen these issues first hand, but I have.”

Loesch, now a radio host, wrote crime is up because AOC and others pushed for a reduction in policing and penalties.

“Also, whenever you want to talk about poverty,' Loesch said, 'I’m happy to tell you about how hard it was for my single mom and me when I was growing up – and it wasn’t in tony *Westchester.*”

None of these policing reductions have even *happened yet.*

So a spike is happening WITH a $6 billion dollar NYPD budget.

You either know this & are intentionally lying, or you‘re a bad spokeswoman & haven’t verified your claims.

Given your work with @NRA it’s probably both. https://t.co/vHtq04ei86

Riley Roberts Ocasio Cortez

Any reductions to police budgets brought on as part of the national reckoning on racial inequality and police brutality hadn’t taken effect yet, AOC said in response. The spike is happening with the current NYPD budget.

“You either know this & are intentionally lying, or you’re a bad spokeswoman & haven’t verified your claims,” AOC shot back. “Given your work with @NRA it’s probably both.”

A series of tweets by both continued, with Loesch bringing Westchester back into the disagreement.

Ocasio Cortez Speech Today

'So ... there is an increase in crime before you cut the budget and you still supporting cutting the budget?' she tweeted. 'Great logic there, Ms. Westchester. Also, before you reach for a weak reed of ergo decedo, I'm not a spokeswoman for anyone but myself.'

AOC, a Democrat who represents the 14th congressional district in the Bronx and Queens, grew up in the northern Westchester town of Yorktown and went to school there. Her ties to the area have often been invoked by AOC’s critics because they say they don’t mesh with her campaign narrative of being from the Bronx.

She became a rising star in the party and a face of the progressive movement in 2018 when she unseated longtime incumbent Joe Crowley in a Democratic primary. But the congresswoman’s high profile has made her a favorite target of conservative critics and social media trolls.

Ocasio-Cortez was 2 years old when her father bought a modest home in Yorktown for $150,000. The family moved from the Bronx to the house a few years later and AOC graduated from Yorktown High School.

She changed her address from Yorktown to the Bronx on her voter registration in October 2016.

Mark Lungariello covers government and politics. Follow him on Facebook @lungariello and Twitter @marklungariello. For our latest subscription offers click here.

This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Westchester roots again a target for critic

Who is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez? After the primary elections in New York Tuesday night, the internet is abuzz with talk of this one particular New Yorker. Here’s what you need to know.

Ocasio Cortez Upbringing

Who is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez?

Ocasio-Cortez is a 28-year-old New Yorker who was born in the Bronx to Puerto Rican parents — her mother was born in Puerto Rico and her father in the Bronx. She grew up in a working-class household, she notes on her website, where her father was a small business owner, her mother cleaned homes and everyone pitched in.

Ocasio-Cortez attended public school 40 minutes north of the Bronx in Yorktown. That 40-minute commute opened her eyes to the effects of income inequality. To her, the commute represented “a vastly different quality of available schooling, economic opportunity, and health outcomes.”

In 2008, her father died of cancer and her family was thrown into a financial crisis. To support her mother, Ocasio-Cortez worked “two jobs and 18-hour shifts in restaurants to help her family keep their home.”

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez primary election win

Here’s why everyone is talking about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez: On Tuesday, she defeated incumbent Joseph Crowley in the New York congressional primary election.

Rep. Crowley, 56, is the fourth-highest ranking Democrat in the House, chair of the House Democratic Caucus and the Queens Democratic Party and was thought by many to be the next speaker of the House. He’s served in Congress since 1999 and hasn’t had a primary challenger in 14 years.

Enter Ocasio-Cortez: she beat out Crowley in the primary for New York’s 14th District, which covers the eastern Bronx and north-central Queens. Ocasio-Cortez won with 57.5 percent of the vote. If she wins in November, she’ll be the youngest person in Congress.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez political views

Ocasio-Cortez is a Democratic Socialist, and she campaigned on several progressive issues. She wants Medicare for all, a federal jobs guarantee program which would provide a baseline of $15-an-hour minimum wage and a benefits package, and tuition-free public college and trade schools.

She wants to abolish ICE, calling for immigration justice that provides a path to citizenship, she advocates for criminal justice reform and the end to for-profit prisons, an assault-weapons ban and more action against climate change.

Ocasio-Cortez also wants more solidarity with Puerto Rico. She laid out a plan on her website for actions like the cancellation of the island Wall Street debt, community-led recovery initiatives and a Marshall Plan to help Puerto Rico not just recover from Hurricane Maria but improve with modern infrastructure.

And, of course, she’s fighting for women’s rights — she’s called out news articles that refused to put her name in headlines and ran a campaign video in which she says, “Women like me aren’t supposed to run for office.”

It’s time for a New York that works for all of us.

On June 26th, we can make it happen – but only if we have the #CourageToChange.

It’s time to get to work. Please retweet this video and sign up to knock doors + more at https://t.co/kacKFI9RtI to bring our movement to Congress. pic.twitter.com/aqKMjovEjZ

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@Ocasio2018) May 30, 2018

What did Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez do before her run for Congress?

Though a political newcomer, Ocasio-Cortez does have some experience in the political world. She organized for Sen. Bernie Sanders during his run for the 2016 presidential primary. She worked with high school students as an Educational Director with National Hispanic Institute and spearheaded projects to improve childhood literacy and writing in the Bronx.

On election day, she retweeted a photo that showed her working as a bartender — from one year ago, Nov. 2017.

This photo is from Nov. 14, 2017. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, 28, was then working as a bartender.

Ocasio Cortez Biography

Less than a year later, she defeated the likely next Speaker of the House, and will almost certainly be the youngest woman ever elected to Congress pic.twitter.com/JgHjdQWAF6

— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) June 27, 2018