Democrats like AOC are trying to shrug off their ‘woke’ era. That’s bad for our politics | CNN Politics

Democrats would very much like to figure out how to explain away some of the far-left things they said circa 2019 and 2020 — a period often referred to as “peak woke,” “woke 1.0” or “woke 1.” Kamala Harris struggled with this during her 2024 presidential campaign (think: some transgender policies), and now it looms over some key 2026 races. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday offered a prescription: Laugh it off. “I have a local city councilman that has this saying: ‘Woke 1 was crazy,’” the New York congresswoman said on ABC’s “This Week,” before laughing. Ocasio-Cortez, who once supported defunding the police, went on to suggest Covid had expanded the range of acceptable political discourse. But she said that it’s “not rhetoric that we would use today.” This might be a politically deft explanation for Ocasio-Cortez and her ilk. But it’s a bad one for the body politic. It continues a troubling trend of major politicians asking Americans not to take the things they say — or more specifically, that they once said — at face value. It’s a perfect recipe for a continued decline in honesty and accountability. Ocasio-Cortez was quoting New Yor