The search for the next AOC

With 2020 congressional primaries just months away, that playbook is about to be put to the test. Justice Democrats has so far endorsed a slate of eight candidates, including Jamaal Bowman, a middle-school teacher challenging Representative Eliot Engel of New York, and Morgan Harper, a former Consumer Financial Protection Bureau adviser who is taking on Representative Joyce Beatty of Ohio.

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But it’s Jessica Cisneros’s primary bid against Representative Henry Cuellar of Texas that will serve as a kind of marquee race for the Justice Democrats next year. The primary election, on March 3, will be among the first elections with a Justice Democrats candidate on the ballot, and could set the tone and trajectory for the rest of its primary challenges. Since her campaign launched in June, Cisneros has secured the endorsement of Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and raised almost $460,000. For context, Ocasio-Cortez raised less than $60,000 in all of 2017 for her own race against Crowley.

Progressives have long been itching to oust Cuellar, who—even though Hillary Clinton won the district by nearly 20 points in 2016—has voted with Donald Trump nearly 70 percent of the time. That’s led Cisneros, a 26-year-old immigration attorney, to label him “Trump’s favorite Democrat,” and separate herself by advocating for a slew of progressive policies, including Medicare for All, a $15 minimum wage, and the Green New Deal.

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