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Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) on Sunday quoted a New York City Council member in describing Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate Francesca Hong’s (D) past positions, saying “Woke 1 was crazy.”
ABC News’s “This Week” host Jonathan Karl asked Ocasio-Cortez in an interview about her opinion on Hong’s past stances and statements, including urging Americans to “cancel Thanksgiving.” The New York lawmaker said Hong has “moved away from it.”
“And I have a local city councilman that has this saying that ‘Woke 1 was crazy,'” she added, causing her and Karl to laugh. “And I think that what’s important is that we have to assess what a candidate is saying now.”
Ocasio-Cortez referred to New York City Council member Chi Ossé, a progressive elected official. Ossé shared a clip of Ocasio-Cortez’s response and wrote on the social platform X, “Woke 1 was crazyyyy, Madame President.”
Karl pressed Ocasio-Cortez about Hong’s past positions, asking if the movement went “too far” with some of its views and pointing out the New York Democrat’s own past stance of abolishing the police.
“Well, you know, I think that during this time and during, especially during COVID, there was a huge opening of the Overton window,” she said. “We were shut down. There was some of the highest unemployment rates that we have seen because of those shutdowns. And I think that the doors were really open in trying to entertain any and every policy that was going to get us to a better place.”
Ocasio-Cortez said these discussions were “quite fruitful” but noted that “during lockdown, of course, rhetoric in that time is not rhetoric that we would use today.”
“And I’m grateful that these candidates have the opportunity to present who they are to their electorate and what they’re campaigning on in this moment,” she added.
Ocasio-Cortez has not endorsed Hong. She told Karl that her “focus has been in winning back the Congress, winning back the House and positioning ourselves to have the best chance possible to win the Senate.”
Hong has made other statements about abolishing prisons and defunding the police, along with her comments about canceling Thanksgiving. She described the holiday to CNN as a “time that’s incredibly painful for many people in our communities.”
She wrote her position down in a since-deleted post on X in 2021, comparing the holiday to a “superspreader event” that led to the deaths of Indigenous peoples in the centuries following the fabled harvest feast.
Hong has walked back from that stance, emphasizing her past work as a professional chef and the meaning that food has in bringing people together. She also said the holiday is her “favorite.”
“I’m just going to be real, I’m kind of a curmudgeon when it comes to holidays in general,” Hong told Politico last week. “But right now, what we want to get serious about is making sure we deliver a Democratic trifecta.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Ocasio-Cortez’s ally in the Senate, also has not endorsed Hong and has offered similar reasons.
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