What Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Really Wanted To Do When She Was Harassed At The Capitol

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pulled off a huge upset when she won her district's Democratic party primary in 2018; she beat out Democratic incumbent Representative Joseph Crowley, who was one of the highest-ranking Democrats in the House, according to The New York Times. AOC made waves upon joining the U.S. House of Representatives, and she became one of the most talked about politicians in the nation, per Time. 

Known for her progressive politics, Ocasio-Cortez is beloved by some and hated by others. She told Vanity Fair that she gets death threats, and she's been harassed by Republican politicians. Former President Donald Trump called her, among other things, a "wack job" on Twitter (via Business Insider). A more direct confrontation happened with Florida Representative Ted Yoho on the Capitol steps in 2020. Yoho was overheard calling Ocasio-Cortez "disgusting" for her comments about the connection between poverty and crime, and as he walked off, he called her a "f***ing b****," per The Hill. He later apologized but denied calling her a name, via CNN.

That wouldn't be the last time AOC faced harassment on the Capitol steps. She did so again more recently, and this time there wasn't any doubt about who said what.

New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted about harassment she faced while walking into the Capitol to her 13 million Twitter followers. In a video of what happened, you can see Alex Stein — known to some as a comedian and to others as a right-wing troll — call out to AOC as she walks up the steps. "You're my favorite big-booty Latina — I love you, AOC, you're my favorite," he shouted. 

He followed up with "She wants to kill babies, but she's still beautiful." Stein added that she was "hot, hot, hot, like a tamale." Ocasio-Cortez tweeted about what she wanted to do in the moment: "I was actually walking over to deck him because if no one will protect us then I'll do it myself but I needed to catch a vote more than a case today".

Ocasio-Cortez has previously talked about how the Capitol doesn't feel safe to her, particularly during the January 6 insurrection, via The Guardian. With the incident with Stein, she's doubled down on that concern. It took five calls to the Capitol Police from AOC's office to get details about Stein, and she said, "We have to keep ourselves safe here because certain people will be safe, but not all of us are safe," per Politico.

Stein also hassled Republican Representative Adam Kinzinger the same day. "There's just a level of anger and violence that we need to be tamping down that we're actually just stoking," Kinzinger told Politico.