Saturday at the South by Southwest Conference & Festivals in Austin, TX, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said former President Ronald Reagan used “racist” caricatures to pit “white working-class Americans against brown and black working-class Americans.”
“One perfect example, I think a perfect example of how special interests and the powerful have pitted white working-class Americans against brown and black working-class Americans in order to just screw over all working-class Americans, is Reaganism in the ’80s when he started talking about welfare queens,” continued Democratic Socialist Ocasio-Cortez. She added that Reagan’s reference to “welfare queens” was “rooted in a racist caricature.”