You cannot move on from the insurrection
AOC’s recount of the U.S. Capitol mob and her sexual assault details the impact of trauma
Whitney Lynn / Contributer
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been known to ruffle a few feathers — as all smart, determined women tend to do. Last week she shared on a live stream that she is a survivor of sexual assault. No one should be surprised that AOC chose to share this personal piece of her life. Her progressive, unfiltered reputation is well known. She explained how trauma compounds itself. Every incident piles on top of the other. The mob attack on the U.S. Capitol brought to the surface the same harrowing feelings she went through when her body was attacked. While Republicans were quick to say that the mob attack was simply a protest of election fraud gone incredibly wrong, I disagree. The mob attack on the Capitol was an attack on every person in that building, and democracy itself. I do not care what political party you subscribe to. If you were not outraged watching the coverage on Jan. 6, it is time to realize that you are part of the problem.
In 2019, there was a Facebook group chat of border patrol agents discovered that frequently spoke of AOC in derogatory, xenophobic, and misogynistic ways. There were edited images and jokes in the chat making up scenarios about raping a sitting congresswoman. About 9,500 agents were in this group chat depicting her rape. These agents are in control of migrant lives, and they found this funny?
In July 2020, Representative Ted Yoho from Florida accosted AOC on the steps of the Capitol. “(He) put his finger in my face, he called me disgusting, he called me crazy, he called me out of my mind and he called me dangerous,” AOC recounted in a viral speech to the House of Representatives. He then went on to call her “a f-cking b-tch’’ in front of a crowd of reporters. AOC stood up for herself and women across the country in refuting Yoho’s apology.
“Representative Yoho decided to come to the floor of the House of Representatives and make excuses for his behavior, and that I could not let go. I could not allow my nieces, I could not allow the little girls that I go home to, I could not allow victims of verbal abuse and worse to see that, to see that excuse and to see our Congress accept it as legitimate and accept it as an apology and to accept silence as a form of acceptance,” AOC said.
Enough is enough. We must hold public officials and officers to a higher standard than this. It’s disgusting and disgraceful.
On Jan. 6, 2021, the U.S. Capitol was attacked by a mob of Trump supporters who purported claims of election fraud. Five people died as a result of the attack. We were all glued to Twitter and news coverage of the insurrection. Pipe bombs were discovered around the Capitol. The public has seen the photos of a man sitting with his feet up on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s desk and a man in an animal costume on the House floor. We saw the chaos and destruction, but we hadn’t heard personal stories. On Monday, Feb. 1, AOC went on Instagram live stream and gave a candid, emotional recount of her experience during the insurrection. The live stream was about 90 minutes long. “I thought I was going to die,” AOC said.
She spoke about being in her office, when there was banging on her door. She says no one identified themselves. Her legislative director instructed her to hide, so she ran to her office’s bathroom. The person trying to get in made it through, and he was screaming “where is she?” according to AOC. She hid behind the door to her bathroom, fearing for her life.
“This is the moment where I thought everything was over … I had a lot of thoughts. You have a lot of thoughts, I think, in a situation like that … I really just felt like if this is the plan for me then people will be able to take it from here … I felt that if this was the journey that my life was taking that I felt that things were going to be okay and that I had fulfilled my purpose,” AOC said, while wiping away tears. The man who broke in turned out to be a Capitol police officer, who failed to identify himself as such. AOC, along with other non-white Americans, aren’t put at ease by the presence of law enforcement. The rest of the day AOC describes as operating on adrenaline. She fled to another building and sheltered with Congresswoman Katie Porter.
AOC was incredibly vulnerable during this live stream, which is something that the public doesn’t normally see from officials. “The reason I say this and the reason I’m getting emotional in this moment is because these folks who tell us to move on, that it’s not a big deal, that we should forget what’s happened, or even telling us to apologize. These are the same tactics of abusers. And I’m a survivor of sexual assault. And I haven’t told many people that in my life. But when we go through trauma, trauma compounds on each other,” AOC said. She has had plenty of trauma during her tenure as a member of Congress, and now opened up sharing she is a survivor of sexual assault. “One reason I’ve hesitated to tell this story has to do with some of that trauma. As a survivor, I struggle with the idea of being believed,” AOC said.
We’ve seen it with Anita Hill, Christine Blasey Ford, and countless other women. AOC’s fear wasn’t irrational. Days after her emotional testimony of her experience during the insurrection, ‘AOC lied’ and ‘Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Smollet’ were trending on Twitter. ‘Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Smollet’ is in reference to Jussie Smollet, an actor who allegedly staged a hate crime against himself. We live in a white supremacist and patriarchal society that fears strong intelligent women, specifically women of color. This cycle of silencing women and minimizing their trauma is nothing new. So, when AOC calls on Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to resign for their part in stoking the insurrection, they do the only thing they know how to do. They call her a liar. They discredit her. They say she wants attention. As AOC put it, these are the “tactics of abusers.” This disgusting response to a woman’s truth shows we have not made as much progress as one would hope. We, must do better. When a survivor is brave enough to come forward with their story, the public has an obligation to accept how the experience made them feel. So no, I will not “move on” from the insurrection, and neither should you.
The views expressed in the editorial and op-ed sections are not necessarily those of The USD Vista staff, the University of San Diego, or its student body.
