Meghan McCain, the daughter of the late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), said on Thursday she expects Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) to run for higher office, buoyed by an effective economic message.
“She’s going to run and her message of economic populism is more powerful than people are giving her credit for,” McCain, a conservative media host, wrote in a post on the social platform X.
She was responding to a 90-second clip released by the “Team AOC” account on X. The video highlighted remarks the progressive New Yorker made during a stop in Idaho on the “Fighting Oligarchy” tour with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on April 14.
“This is what this country is all about. Don’t let them trick us into thinking we are enemies. Don’t let them trick us into thinking we can be separated into rural and urban, Black and white and Latino. We are one,” Ocasio-Cortez said in front of the Idaho crowd.
“Idaho, I know that looking around here, it can feel impossible for Republicans out here to be defeated. That’s not true. It’s simply not true. And from the waitress who is now speaking to you today from this podium, I can tell you: Impossible is nothing,” Ocasio-Cortez added, in the remarks highlighted in the ad.
McCain is just the latest observer to speculate about Ocasio-Cortez’s potential future rise in the Democratic Party.
Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said he thinks Ocasio-Cortez could become the next party leader in a few years, saying progressives like Ocasio-Cortez will “raise more money running against Democrats than they will running against Republicans. And whoever comes out of that will become the leader of the Democratic Party.”
Pollster Nate Silver also named Ocasio-Cortez as his early pick to be the leader of the party come the next White House election cycle.
Ocasio-Cortez raised nearly $9.6 million in the first quarter this year, her biggest three-month fundraising period yet. She enters the second quarter with $8.2 million in cash on hand.