AOC: From Resolutions To Red Lipstick
A few weeks ago, I was sitting at the counter of a small kitchen in the Bronx while Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) made black bean soup in an Instant Pot and told me about her transition into office.
Well, it didn’t exactly happen like that. But Rep. Ocasio-Cortez did go on Instagram Live to talk to her followers as she made dinner, pausing to respond to comments and read what questions her viewers had asked her. It felt like a regular weekday evening, and as she spoke about a new recipe she was trying while talking about the issue of cash bails for defendants, I almost forgot that she represents New York’s 14th Congressional District.
It was refreshing to see a member of Congress who connected directly with people and shared her journey to the hallowed chambers of our nation’s legislative branch.
Since watching that Instagram Live, I have continued watching Ocasio-Cortez’ daily updates on her Instagram Story. During one update, she documented how the incoming class of Freshman representatives attended workshops and a “boot camp” to learn the how legislation is written, introduced to each House, and voted on.
Ocasio-Cortez showed us how elected representatives have to choose a phone to use for official business and how there is a lottery system to choose one’s office in the House. The minute details of holding federal office had been brought right to my phone, and to her more than two million followers on her personal account.
From using her Instagram Story to explain why the government shutdown dragged on to giving a mini-tutorial on press-on manicures as she rode the Amtrak from Washington D.C. to Manhattan, Cortez uses her social media platforms not only as an outlet but also as a bridge to her constituents. Through her posts, Ocasio-Cortez is to shows how she is really not that different from the rest of us, a message that often doesn’t get conveyed by other legislators.
The ways in which Ocasio-Cortez shares her daily life with her viewers, with events both large and small, is emblematic of her overall message: that there is not just one way to become a Congressman, or woman, for that matter.
The Center for American Women Politics reported that 30 years ago, during the 96th Congress, only 3.6% of the Representatives in the House of Representatives were women. Today, over 23% of Representatives are women. Although there is still a disproportionate amount of men in Congress, Ocasio-Cortez is the face of a new wave of diversity, not only for women but also for people of color, as the 116th Congress proved to be the most diverse incoming class the nation has ever seen.
Social media has come to take a central role in political campaigns and the political landscape as a whole, with Pew Research Center reporting that the number of registered voters following political figures has doubled between 2010 and 2014. Still, Ocasio-Cortez strongly represents youth politics with her uniquely direct use of social media to communicate with her constituents. Just as social media influencers use live streams and Instagram stories to talk to their fans “one to one”, Ocasio-Cortez ensures that her social media output gives her viewers the impression that it is solely her own voice communicating on the screen, not the carefully curated posts made by professional teams of digital marketers. This notion that Rep. Ocasio-Cortez’s posts are written and produced by her alludes to her overall message of being a down-to-earth politician that is both independent and capable of creating her own content and communicating it effectively.
Corbin Trent, Ocasio-Cortez’s Director of Communications said in an interview to the Rolling Stone Magazine that the goal of the representative’s content is “to shed as much light on the process and to be as open and transparent as possible, to give people an insight into what a freshman Congressperson is like, to give them some insight into what their government’s like, and hopefully make [politics] seem less foreign and unapproachable.”
Regardless of whether you agree with her policy or not, I do believe that Ocasio Cortez has made the often opaque and elusive process of running for office and eventually being voted into office clearer for her audience. She has also made her stories accessible to people of all abilities, adding in English captions for people who are hard of hearing. Ocasio-Cortez has taken her position as a young woman, the youngest woman to ever get elected to Congress, and uses her journey to show that others can reach the same destination, regardless of what path they are currently on.
Ocasio-Cortez’s social media platforms also serve to destigmatize the often-stuffy process of Congressional life, and the Federal Government as a whole. She is a prime example of someone who wasn’t on the conventional political trajectory, she is a graduate from Boston University who bartended at a Taco restaurant before deciding to run for office as an attempt to address the problems her minority-dominated community faced.
A few weeks ago, on January 3rd, I checked Ocasio-Cortez’s Instagram updates and watched as she was sworn into the 116th Congress. She wore a white suit as a nod to the color of the Women’s suffrage movement. She accessorized with hoops and red lipstick to stand in solidarity with Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor who was advised to wear neutral tones during her Senate confirmation and wore red lipstick and hoops as an act of defiance. Her inauguration no longer felt like I was watching some distant political figure repeat a custom that had been done thousands of times before. It felt like someone I knew was turning a new page in Congressional and American history. This was a page where a young Latina woman from the Bronx can beat a 20-year incumbent Congressman, proving that we the people decide who represents us, and that an individual can break the mold of past precedent and create a new wave for the future.
Megan Orlanski ’22 studies in the College of Ats & Sciences. She can be reached at morlanski@wustl.edu.