ALEXANDRIA Ocasio-Cortez has bravely revealed that she is a survivor of sexual assault. The Democratic representative also described being terrified for her life during the storming of the US Capitol in an emotional broadcast. How old is AOC? American politician Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez – widely known as AOC – is 31 years old. She was born […]
ALEXANDRIA Ocasio-Cortez has bravely revealed that she is a survivor of sexual assault.
The Democratic representative also described being terrified for her life during the storming of the US Capitol in an emotional broadcast.
American politician Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez – widely known as AOC – is 31 years old. She was born in October, 1989.
She describes herself as “a third-generation Bronxite, educator, and organiser”.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is an American politician, educator and political activist who made history in the US midterm elections of 2018 to become the youngest woman in Congress in American history.
Then aged 29, the Democrat and won the congressional race for New York’s 14th District – covering the Bronx and Queens – with more than 74.3 per cent of the vote.
It was seen as the biggest upset of the US midterms in 2018.
AOC won re-election to the House in New York’s 14th Congressional District in November 2020.
Ocasio-Cortez was born on October 13, 1989, in the Bronx, New York, but grew up in Yorktown Heights, Westchester County.
She is the daughter of working class parents of Puerto Rican descent.
After high school, AOC attended Boston University and graduated with degrees in economics and international relations.
During this period she also worked in the office of the late Senator Ted Kennedy.
Upon moving back to the Bronx, she worked as a bartender in Manhattan as well as a waitress in taqueria (taco stand).
She established a publishing firm, Brook Avenue Press, which specialises in children’s literature which portrays the Bronx in a positive light.
After finding out she had been purged from the New York voter rolls and could not vote in the 2016 primary, AOC worked as an organiser for Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign.
After that general election, she travelled across America by car, visiting places like Flint, Michigan, and Standing Rock, and speaking to people affected by the human rights violations related to the Flint water crisis and the Dakota Access Pipeline.
Her visit to Standing Rock was a tipping point, with AOC saying that before that, she had felt the only way to run for office was if you had access to wealth, social influence, and power.
But her visit to North Dakota, where she saw others “putting their whole lives and everything that they had on the line for the protection of their community,” inspired her to begin to work for her own community.
Prominent US lawmaker Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has revealed that she is a survivor of sexual assault.
In an emotional video message shared on February 1, 2021, she also described fearing for her life during the deadly storming of the US Capitol on January 6.
The New York congresswoman drew parallels between the lawmakers seeking to “move on” from the Capitol riot and the denial tactics used by abusers.
“I’m a survivor of sexual assault and I haven’t told many people that in my life,” she told her Instagram followers.
“As a survivor, I struggle with the idea of being believed.”
She gave no further details about the sex attack, or when it took place.
The 31-year-old explained that when survivors go through trauma, “trauma compounds on each other”.
Ocasio-Cortez also recounted the terror she felt during the assault on the US legislature.
“I thought I was going to die,” she said.
AOC described how she and a staffer were forced to take shelter in a bathroom in her congressional office.
Her online remarks – viewed more than 350,000 times – drew widespread praise for bravery and honesty.
Fellow lawmaker Katie Porter took to MSNBC to say that she had given Ocasio-Cortez a pair of sneakers during the riot, in case she needed to “run for her life”.
“I just hope I get to be a mom. I hope I don’t die today,” Porter recounted AOC as having told her.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been dating her boyfriend Riley Roberts for over four years.
The Congresswoman met Roberts – from Scottsdale, Arizona – during her undergraduate years at Boston University.
He earned double degrees in sociology and finance while attending the uni’s Questrom School of Business.
According to his Linkedin profile, Roberts works in web development.
AOC’s current net worth is an estimated $100,000, according to Celebrity Net Worth.
This figure cannot be verified, however.
Back in 2018, Vox reported: “Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez isn’t rich.
“Your bank account shouldn’t be a requirement for participating in democracy.”
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez won re-election to the House in New York’s 14th Congressional District in November 2020.
The win came two years after she led the congressional race for New York’s 14th District, during the 2018 US midterms.
