Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) dismissed a question of whether or not she’ll run for president in 2028 on Friday night, stating that her “ambition is way bigger.”
“My ambition is to change this country,” Ocasio-Cortez told Democratic strategist David Axelrod during a conversation hosted by the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics. “Presidents come and go, Senate, House seats, elected officials, come and go, but single-payer healthcare is forever. A living wage is forever. Workers’ rights are forever. Women’s rights — all of that.”
The representative is among a group of people whom voters see as potential Democratic candidates for the 2028 presidential election, including Gov. Gavin Newsom (Calif.), former Vice President Kamala Harris, and former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.
However, according to Ocasio-Cortez, her political ambitions are to “meet the moment,” noting that “conditions change radically all the time.”
“So I make my response less to an attachment to some ... title or position, and working backwards from there.” Ocasio-Cortez told Axelrod. “But I make decisions by waking up in the morning, looking out the window and observing the conditions of this country and saying what move or what decision can I make today that is going to get us closer to that future, stronger, faster, better than yesterday and those conditions.”
