AOC mocked after digging in on 'woke' agenda items as Democrats retreat from them

While many progressives are starting to retreat from "wokeness" in the wake of the Republican victories in Virginia, New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D., cautioned her colleagues against letting that term distract them and "distancing" themselves from "racial justice" issues.

"One dangerous aspect of thinking there’s a ‘woke problem’ is that Dem chances for re-election or majorities in House, Senate, & WH rely on the racial justice issue of voting rights," she tweeted Sunday. "Dems distancing from racial justice makes protection of voting rights less likely, ensuring losses."

Ocasio-Cortez rejected the term "woke" as a word used by critics to try and demonize their agenda. Over the weekend, she also claimed that the term is "almost exclusively used by older people."

"'Woke' is a term pundits are now using as a derogatory euphemism for civil rights & justice," Ocasio-Cortez added in a follow-up tweet. "Making up a ‘woke’ problem results in putting civil & voting rights on the backburner. In a year state legislatures are planning out GOP majorities & voter suppression, that’s dangerous."

But many analysts concluded in their Virginia election autopsies that the Democrats' "woke" agenda was a recipe for disaster. Terry McAuliffe and his supporters appeared to support schools' progressive agendas, for instance, even as parents continued to voice their concerns about graphic material and the use of critical race theory in the classrooms.

AOC BLASTS CARVILLE FOR USING TERM 'WOKENESS,' SAYS MOSTLY 'OLDER PEOPLE' USE THE WORD

But, some conservative Twitter users encouraged the progressive congresswoman to keep doubling down on a strategy they said proved to be unsuccessful in Virginia last Tuesday. 

BONGINO BLASTS AOC'S ‘WOKE’ TWEET: ‘THE VERY DEFINITION OF RACISM’

Democrats like Rev. Al Sharpton took a different approach, admitting that the movement needs to start being less aggressive in their messaging. Further, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd mused that "wokeness" could "derail" Democrats in future elections if they don't tread lightly or engage in a full retreat. 

"What went wrong is stupid wokeness," Democratic strategist James Carville also said of McAuliffe's resounding defeat.

Fox News host Dan Bongino said the representative's tweets made it harder for him "to candidly take AOC seriously."

Bongino wondered if Ocasio Cortez had seen the exit polling in Virginia that found education was a top issue for voters or if she was too "dumb" to process it.

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"When you tell people that critical race theory or whatever euphemism you use for it is going to be the bedrock of the education structure going forward and we're going to use race essentialism and judge people as oppressor or oppressed exclusively based on skin color — that is the very definition of racism," Bongino said Monday on "Fox & Friends." They know this. This is all about class warfare against successful people to advance socialism in the form of fighting racism because it's a more palatable narrative for them."