Socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Shocks With Joe Crowley Defeat

QUEENS, NY – Newcomer Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez will be the Democratic nominee for District 14 after ousting powerful Queens Democratic party chairman Joe Crowley from his spot representing the northern Queens and eastern Bronx district in a major upset Tuesday night.

The result sent shockwaves through the Democratic establishment. Crowley, a 10-term veteran expected by many to be his party's next leader in Congress, was beaten by the 28-year-old who campaigned for Bernie Sanders in the last presidential election and who calls herself a socialist.

Ocasio-Cortez won 57 percent of the votes to Crowley's 42 percent with about 88 percent of the precincts reported, according to unofficial results from the New York State Board of Elections. NY1 called the race for Ocasio-Cortez at 9:54 p.m.

She will move on to compete in the November general election to represent the 14th Congressional District, which covers Astoria, College Point, East Elmhurst, Jackson Heights and Woodside in Queens and Morris Park, Parkchester, Pelham Bay and Throgs Neck in the Bronx.

Ocasio-Cortez, a former staffer on Bernie Sanders' campaign from the Bronx, is among the left-wing Democrats who have worked to shift the party since Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential election campaign. Crowley, the fourth-ranking Democrat in the House, represents the type of entrenched establishment they're trying to throw out.

"This is the community’s moment," Ocasio-Cortez said of her win.

"I knew that with the right stuff, with the right organizing, with the right commitments, that it was possible."

Polls closed at 9 p.m. on Tuesday, but both Crowley and Oscasio-Cortez kept at the campaign trails and managed to sneak in some last minute jabs in the hours leading up to the cutoff.

Ocasio-Cortez took to Twitter on Tuesday morning to accuse Crowley's team of fixing her campaign posters to trees and reporting them to the NYC Sanitation Department in an attempt to have her fined.

"They are trying to ratchet us into $10k worth of fines," she tweeted.

A spokeswoman for Crowley fired back, calling the accusations "not only wrong but highly irresponsible."

"The Crowley campaign has several hundred volunteers knocking on ten of thousands doors, so we’re far too busy talking to voters to pay attention to posters or Ms. Ocasio-Cortez’s conspiracy theories," his spokeswoman told Patch.

But Crowley offered kinder words after the race was called against him Tuesday night.

“At the end of the day, this district will be represented by a Democrat, and it’s the Democratic party that is going to lead this nation forward,” he said.

Also representing Queens in the Democratic primaries are New York's Fifth and 12th Congressional Districts.

Rep. Gregory Meeks kept his seat representing southern Queens in District 5 after beating out challengers Mizan Choudhury and Carl Achille in a landslide. The Fifth Congressional District covers Jamaica, Cambria Heights, Hollis, Laurelton, Queens Village, Rosedale, Saint Albans, Springfield Gardens, South Ozone Park and the Rockaways.

In District 12, which covers northwest Queens along with parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn, newcomer Suraj Patel is taking on Rep. Carolyn Maloney, who has been in Congress for more than two decades.

Lead photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images.