Ocasio-Cortez: the first millennial political icon?

Beyond Today

BBC

News

4.6 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 22 January 2019

⏱️ 22 minutes

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Summary

Politics on both sides of the Atlantic feels a bit stuck. The government in the US has been shut down for the longest period in its history and politicians here can’t agree on how to make Brexit work. But there are people challenging existing power structures. Last week we heard from Gina Martin, the 27 year old who has got a law banning upskirting through Parliament. And today we’re talking about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. She’s only been in office for a few weeks, but she’s already using her social media superstardom to shape political conversation in the US. WNYC political reporter Brigid Bergin and Jon Ossoff, who ran for Congress in 2017, consider whether AOC is an anomaly or part of a wider movement of change. Producer: Harriet Noble Mixed by Nicolas Raufast Editor: John Shields

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts.
0:06.6	Hello, I'm Matthew Price. This is Beyond Today from BBC Radio 4.
0:11.1	Each weekday we ask one big question about one big story.
0:17.0	Today is
0:23.2	the first millennial political icon.
0:28.8	One of the subjects that we're interested in on the team is power and how it works.
0:35.0	A few episodes ago, we spoke to Gina Martin, the 27 year old woman who's worked the power structures in the UK to get the law changed on
0:44.0	upskirting. Now Harriet one of the producers has been wanting to do an episode
0:49.4	on another woman in her late 20s who also represents a challenge to the established
0:54.3	powers and Harriet you're finally getting to do your episode. Yes so excited who is
0:59.7	who's this woman? This is 29 year old Alexandria or Kaseo Cortez, otherwise known as AOC.
1:08.5	And I wanted to show you, to start with, her Instagram. So this is one of her Instagram.
1:12.6	So this is one of her Instagram stories
1:15.4	that she's got kind of saved on the top of her page.
1:18.0	So this is from a few months ago,
1:19.8	but it's kind of there for anyone to see.
1:21.9	So it's called Pep Talk and this is what she's saying.
1:25.6	People ask me how I'm feeling. I feel good. I feel okay. I mean like the thing that's hard is that you're supposed to be perfect all the time on every issue.
1:38.0	So, and what...
1:40.0	What do you think when you see that, Matt?
1:42.0	Okay, what I don you think is
1:44.4	is politician?
	...

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