Nancy Pelosi Faces New Challenge From AOC & Co.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez @ SXSW 2019 by nrkbeta, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0/Original

Emboldened by her win against Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi last month over the anti-hate bill, AOC is once again flexing her muscles.

Freshman Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) are strongly opposed to a plan by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) to protect incumbents from primary challenges.

Over the weekend, they were able to quickly rally the progressive base against the plan to “blacklist political firms that work against sitting members of Congress.”

Both AOC and Pressley won seats which had been held by long-time members of the Democratic caucus. They would now like to recruit new, more progressive candidates to challenge those whom they consider to be too moderate. Understandably, this has created friction between the Democratic establishment and the outspoken liberal wing led by AOC.

Fox News reported that “Justice Democrats,” the group that boosted Ocasio-Cortez’s primary bid last year, has blanketed its Twitter feed with shout-outs to the two freshmen, while its director Alexandra Rojas is doing the same – while accusing the DCCC of being “afraid” of the Pressleys and AOCs of the world.”

The group also thanked Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), the vice chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, for his strong opposition to the DCCC plan. Khanna said “the new policy stifles competition and blackballs any consultant who works for a challenger” and called it “heavy-handed.” He added, “This unprecedented grab of power is a slap in the face of Democratic voters across the nation. Let’s be clear. If this policy remains in place, it will mean that we will not allow new Ayanna Pressleys or AOCs to emerge. It’s simply wrong.”

On Saturday, AOC tweeted:

“The @DCCC’s new rule to blacklist+boycott anyone who does business w/ primary challengers is extremely divisive & harmful to the party.”

“My recommendation, if you’re a small-dollar donor: pause your donations to DCCC & give directly to swing candidates instead.”

And Pressley tweeted:

“If the DCCC enacts this policy to blacklist vendors who work with challengers, we risk undermining an entire universe of potential candidates and vendors — especially women and people of color — whose ideas, energy, and innovation need a place in our party.”

“Our diversity is our strength. When a candidate takes the risk to run, Democrats should not be in the practice of creating litmus tests or roadblocks that have a chilling effect on new candidates or those who would invest their sweat equity in support.”

The DCCC released a statement on this policy which said that their “core mission” is to protect incumbents. “The DCCC will not conduct business with, nor recommend to any of its targeted campaigns, any consultant that works with an opponent of a sitting Member of the House Democratic Caucus.”

We’ll see how this turns out. I imagine AOC will prevail once again. After all, she holds the real power in the House now.