AOC Suffers Double Blow As Socialism Takes Over Dem Party
New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the socialist wing of the Democratic Party suffered a series of political blows this week, underscoring growing resistance to far-left ideology even within deep-blue territory.
As New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani prepared to travel to Washington for his first meeting with President Donald J. Trump, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan resolution condemning what lawmakers described as the “horrors of socialism.”
“A yes vote on this resolution should be a relatively straightforward, easy decision. It simply states that Congress denounces socialism in all its forms and opposes the implementation of socialist policies in the United States of America,” said Republican Rep. French Hill of Arkansas during floor debate.
The resolution passed decisively, 285–98, with support from 86 Democrats — a notable rebuke to the progressive movement championed by AOC and her allies. Fourteen of those Democratic votes came from New York and New Jersey, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who only offered his endorsement of Mamdani in the closing days of the mayoral race.
Additional New York Democrats voting in favor included Reps. Ritchie Torres of the Bronx, Greg Meeks and Grace Meng of Queens, and Long Island Reps. Laura Gillen and Tom Suozzi. Suozzi, in particular, made clear throughout the campaign that he wanted no association with Mamdani’s brand of politics.
Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis of Staten Island also supported the resolution, drawing on her family’s personal history. Her mother fled Cuba in 1959 to escape what she described as “the very things that our new socialist mayor in New York City says he wants.”
Despite repeated warnings about socialism’s historical record of failure, Mamdani and Ocasio-Cortez continue pushing what critics describe as a radical “socialist movement” that could pose serious risks for Democrats heading into the 2026 midterm elections.
“Two more candidates who are proud to align themselves with socialism are running for important House seats in solid blue districts in Democrat-controlled states. The secret sauce fueling this phenomenon is a widely perceived belief among the progressives who dominate the grassroots of the party that the Democratic establishment is corrupt to the core and must not just be reformed but thoroughly eradicated,” wrote Liberty Nation’s Joe Schaeffer.
That internal Democratic fracture is playing out most clearly in California, where Saikat Chakrabarti — a former AOC aide — is challenging the party’s old guard. Speaking to NBC News in an interview published Nov. 19, Chakrabarti framed the fight bluntly.
“In my opinion, the real moment right now in the Democratic Party is, do we want to go back to the politics as usual?” he said, dismissing his likely rival as “part of that normal establishment politics.”
That rival is California State Sen. Scott Wiener, a fixture of the Democratic mainstream and one of the most aggressively left-wing lawmakers in the state. While Wiener is closely aligned with party leadership, his record on controversial issues — including prioritizing transgender youth “rights” over parental authority and advancing policies that normalize street-level prostitution — could become liabilities even in the Bay Area.
Both Chakrabarti and Wiener are competing for the Democratic nomination to fill the House seat being vacated by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).
Just a few years ago, during the Biden administration’s peak influence in Washington, party conditions may have favored an establishment figure like Wiener. But in 2025, the political momentum appears to be shifting toward the activist left, fueled by dissatisfaction with party leadership and emboldened by figures like Ocasio-Cortez.
Chakrabarti was a co-founder of the Justice Democrats, the insurgent progressive group that vaulted AOC to national prominence after her 2018 upset victory.
That same movement is now targeting Democratic leadership directly. Among its rising figures is Chi Osse, a 27-year-old New York City councilman mounting a primary challenge against Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Osse left the Democratic Socialists of America in 2022 over internal disputes, only to rejoin the organization this past summer.
Still, even as socialist-aligned activists gain ground, establishment Democrats are not without defenses.
“Power to the people! But is it really as easy as that? The Democratic establishment hasn’t run the show for decades by dumb luck. It still has potent cards to play. The mystique of incumbency and the assertion that capturing vital offices can be achieved only by supporting the pecking order already locked into place still carry pragmatic pull even among the most inflamed pitchfork-carrying progressives,” Schaeffer wrote.
As President Trump’s second term continues to reshape the national political landscape, Democrats now face a reckoning of their own: whether to double down on radical ideology — or confront the growing backlash against it.