AOC, Mamdani Retreat From 'Defund the Police' Stance

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said on August 9 that she and other progressive politicians, including Democratic Socialists of America candidates, have "moved away" from statements made during the pandemic about police and prison abolition. Speaking to an ABC News anchor, she cited a local city councilman's phrase, "Woke 1 was crazy," and said that while she believes the 2020-era discussions were "quite fruitful," the rhetoric used then is not rhetoric politicians would use now.

Days later, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani echoed the sentiment, saying his pandemic-era tweets supporting the defund movement were "out of step" with his current position. "I do not believe in defunding the police," Mamdani said, adding that public safety requires working with the police department "alongside many other partners."

New York City Council member Chi Ossé, who Ocasio-Cortez referenced, claimed credit for coining the term "woke 1," which critics say has been used to minimize statements made after George Floyd's murder in May 2020.

Writer and organizer Derecka Purnell argues in a Guardian opinion piece that the retreat by Ocasio-Cortez, Mamdani and Ossé endangers grassroots organizers who built long-term abolitionist campaigns, rather than adopting the ideas through viral social media moments. Purnell notes that Mamdani, unlike Ocasio-Cortez and Ossé, had reversed a campaign-era commitment to add nearly 600 officers and $70 million to the NYPD after pressure from DSA's racial justice working group, even as he touted historic lows in city crime.

Purnell cites geographer Ruth Wilson Gilmore's research showing crime accounts for only about 10% of the rise in U.S. incarceration since 1980, arguing that the retreat from defund rhetoric obscures the deeper political and economic forces driving mass incarceration.