How Ocasio-Cortez’s Trump-like tactics could be her downfall

But the establishment media does not depend on Ocasio-Cortez as they do Trump. To the contrary, Ocasio-Cortez poses a threat to the media that so far has gone unrecognized by both.

When Trump attacks the media, it largely fits in a comfortable partisan frame from which both benefit. Trump scores points with the right; his targets pose as martyrs and let negative partisanship drive the left into their arms. This dynamic is increasingly important to establishment media, which now depends on the support of liberal audiences––in terms of subscriptions, niche marketing, and otherwise––as technological disruption wreaks havoc on bottom lines throughout the journalism industry.

Ocasio-Cortez has begun attacking the establishment media from the left. Those attacks––coming from a fellow traveler and media crush––will carry far more weight with the core audiences of The New York Times and The Washington Post and be far more corrosive of their business model than whatever Trump has to say.