AOC’s DNC Speech Highlights Her Evolution From Democratic Outsider to Face of Its Future

When Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) stepped onto the Democratic National Convention stage in Chicago on Monday night, the crowd erupted in chants of “A-O-C.”

The 34-year-old’s speech electrified the room of Democrats, representing a dramatic shift from when the congresswoman from Queens first entered the scene in 2018 as an outsider and challenger to the party establishment—a democratic socialist who unseated 10-term incumbent Rep. Joseph Crowley, protested Democratic leadership in the House, and quickly became the poster child for the Democratic Party’s outlier left wing.

In 2020, Ocasio-Cortez only received a 90-second speaking slot to introduce Sen. Bernie Sanders. But her primetime speech in 2024 reflects a changing party of which some believe she represents the future.

Read More: Why This DNC Is Different: A New Generation Is Steering, Finally

Ocasio-Cortez demonstrated how she has evolved to become more mainstream in the Democratic Party, using her time on stage to make the case for Harris and downballot Democrats to a more left-leaning and progressive audience. “I am here tonight because America has before us a rare and precious opportunity. In Kamala Harris, we have a chance to elect a President who is for the middle class, because she is from the middle class,” she said. “But we cannot send Kamala and Tim to the White House alone. Together we must also elect strong Democratic majorities in the House and in the Senate so that we can deliver on an ambitious agenda for the people.”

Ocasio-Cortez also focused her criticism on Republican nominee former President Donald Trump, rather than the shortcomings of her own party as she’s famously addressed in the past. “We know that Donald Trump would sell this country for $1 if it meant lining his own pockets and greasing the palms of his Wall Street friends,” adding that she is tired of hearing about “how a two-bit union buster thinks of himself as more of a patriot than the woman who fights every single day to lift working people out from under the boots of greed, trampling on our way of life.”

Still, Ocasio-Cortez showed slivers of her progressive politics that stray from the party line, mentioning the need for a ceasefire in Gaza at a time when the Biden administration has been criticized by activists for its support of Israel’s ongoing military campaign.

Observers noticed Ocasio-Cortez’s transformation, with many commenting  on social media about her reception and increasingly uncontroversial remarks at the convention of Democrats. Others hailed her political talent and suggested that she will rise further in the party and government in the years to come.

“AOC is simply GREAT at this. One of the best political communicators in elected office in our modern era,” wrote one user on X. “Damn, AOC knows how to give a speech,” echoed Jon Favreau, Crooked Media cofounder and former speechwriter for former President Barack Obama.

Amanda Litman, cofounder and executive director of the progressive PAC Run for Something, posted: “If @AOC wants to be president one day, she will be president one day. Absolutely no doubt about it.”

For her part, Ocasio-Cortez has maintained that she doesn’t have her sights set on higher office than the House. In her DNC speech, she instead doubled down on her commitment to bringing a working-class perspective to politics, recalling her past experience as a waitress without health insurance, struggling to pay bills after her father died from cancer. She reiterated how more people who have experienced similar struggles—such as Harris, she said—need to be in government and in the White House.

“Republicans have attacked me by saying that I should go back to bartending,” she said. “But let me tell you, I’m happy to, any day of the week, because there is nothing wrong with working for a living.”