'Support all women': MAGA Republicans outraged at AOC's viral insult of GOP activist [View all]

Ailia ZehraOctober 27, 2025 | 05:06PM ET

Editor's note: This headline has been updated.

A social media exchange between Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and conservative activist Riley Gaines ignited a firestorm among MAGA Republicans on Monday.


Gaines, a former collegiate swimmer and vocal critic of transgender women in women's sports, shared a photo on the social platform X of Ocasio-Cortez with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani (D) at a rally in New York held Sunday.

Gaines wrote, "We're being destroyed from within."

Ocasio-Cortez reacted to her post and wrote, "Maybe if you channeled all this anger into swimming faster you wouldn’t have come in fifth."

The remark referenced Gaines's fifth-place finish at the 2022 NCAA Swimming Championships, where she tied with transgender swimmer Lia Thomas.
https://www.alternet.org/aoc-maga-gop/

Smart, unrelenting.