You’d think by now folks would know better than to run up on Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but alas they never learn.
On Tuesday night, Fox News’ Laura Ingraham, and her guest of the moment Joe DiGenova, decided it would be fun to mock the young congresswoman for her name and based off her accent, claiming she was doing “Latina thing” whatever that means.
“You notice when she introduces herself, does she take on that Obama, you know, Obama put on accents…” Ingraham told DiGenova on Tuesday’s episode of The Ingraham Angle.
“She does the Latina thing where she does her, you know, ’Anastasio Ocasio-Cortez,” DiGenova agreed, putting on an exaggerated accent and butchering Ocasio-Cortez’s name while he was at it.
“And I assume she’s going to love that when I do that,” he added after he was done.
Ingraham guest Joe Digenova says @AOC "does the Latino thing" when she talks. pic.twitter.com/sa1LLExkBA
— Jason Campbell (@JasonSCampbell) March 20, 2019
But again AOC is not the one to be trifled with, and so she swiftly bit into Ingraham and DiGenova’s mockery.
“If by ‘the Latina thing,’ she means I actually do the work instead of just talk about it, then yeah, I’m doing ‘the Latina thing.’” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. Unless of course she‘s talking about being multilingual, which we know isn’t a ‘Latina thing.’ It’s a ‘21st century’ thing.
If by ‘the Latina thing,’ she means I actually do the work instead of just talk about it, then yeah, I’m doing ‘the Latina thing.’
Unless of course she‘s talking about being multilingual, which we know isn’t a ‘Latina thing.’
It’s a ‘21st century’ thing.https://t.co/v41dAyjshP
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 21, 2019
But she didn’t stop there, launching a series of tweets, educating everyone on her name while not-so-subtly calling out Ingraham on her bigotry.
“How dare they refuse to say their name in a wrong accent & not mangle their own family name so that I can feel more comfortable instead of look inside myself & examine why something as small as *a person’s name* makes me uncomfortable in the first place?? This is an outrage!” https://t.co/ArYd28WVcv
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 21, 2019
By the way: Fox News likes to say my name (incorrectly) as “Cortez,” which I can only imagine is bc that sounds more ‘stereotypically’ Hispanic + probably incites more ‘anxiety’ for them.
Pro Tip:
My last name is not “Cortez,” just as theirs isn’t “Ingra” or “Carl” or “Hann.”— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 21, 2019
My last name is Ocasio-Cortez. Full stop. That’s my name.
No, you can’t say “Cortez.” I’ve never used that in my life. “Cortez” is referring to someone else.
Even if they‘re trying to be rude + wrong, my dad’s last name was Ocasio anyway.
(His name was hyphenated too, though.)
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 21, 2019
For the curious, in Latinx culture children take *both* their parents‘ names.
It’s not a “progressive, new thing.” It’s just how some names work. PR hyphenates, others mark differently. Your last name = the families that came together to make you.
AOC is also fine though 🙂
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) March 21, 2019