Democratic Socialist champion Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has continuously advocated for a higher tax burden, including on poorer Americans and the middle class, via taxes they would be required to pay to fund a universal Medicare plan.
But a review of public records undertaken by the Crimson Hub shows that even when Ocasio-Cortez was taking a salary from her campaign during the 2018 cycle when she was first elected to Congress, property tax bills for the condo AOC occupied in the Bronx were not being billed to the soon-to-be congresswoman.
In fact, those bills were being sent to the celebrity politician’s mother, who remained legally responsible for them. That indicates that even while paying herself out of campaign donors’ money, AOC was relying on the bank of Mom to cover her costs.
At the time of her first campaign, AOC was close to thirty—despite becoming the youngest-ever female Member of Congress when sworn into office in 2019.
But throughout the period, property taxes on the Bronx condo were being sent to her mother, who—like many New Yorkers since—had relocated to Florida. Now, as then, AOC’s mother lives in a house that could charitably be described as “modest” in Eustis.
In May 2016, a property tax lien for $4,713.17 was sold by the City of New York to Tower Capital Management LLC. The bill to Tower Capital was paid before they could auction the property for past-due bills.
Even after having lived through years of unpaid property taxes and a lien being placed on the property, a 2019 public records search also indicated tax liens on the Bronx property for non-payment of condo fees.
The timeline suggests that AOC and her boyfriend, Riley Roberts, who was himself paid by a PAC supporting her 2018 campaign, had skirted bills legally due, raising questions about both their abilities to “adult” and the ability of people in their then-financial circumstances to fund higher taxes like those advocated for by the now-congresswoman.
Of note, congressional disclosures show that AOC has always been a relatively poor Member of Congress, with little in the way of assets registered in her name, suggesting that at least at the outset of her political career, she would have been living beyond her means.
Today, Ocasio-Cortez no longer lives at the condo—she has instead relocated to a three-bedroom, two-bath Elmhurst apartment that was last listed for rent in 2022 for $3,200 a month.
According to Zillow, the unit boasts a granite countertop, a marble bathroom, and a private balcony.
The Bronx condo she lived in during her congressional campaign instead appears to now be occupied by her brother, Gabriel. The tax bills for the apartment continue to be sent to the Ocasio-Cortez siblings’ mother, not Gabriel, who is in his early thirties.
Like his sister, Gabriel is an avowed anti-capitalist who founded an arts organization “supporting the deaf queer community.”
Despite having reported a $4,597 per month salary as a housing specialist at Samaritan Daytop Village in Briarwood, NY, back in 2022, he declared Chapter 7 bankruptcy—making him another Ocasio-Cortez kid who manifestly has lived beyond his means.
It is not clear to what degree AOC has helped Gabriel financially, though as a Member of Congress, she earns $174,000 per year, and presumably is equipped to aid her brother in covering his costs—including any property tax bills.
Still, AOC and Gabriel’s mother remains on the hook for those, and not her kids who have actually occupied the Bronx unit.
While AOC’s family is decidedly less well-off than that of her fellow Socialist, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, public records still paint a picture of her and her brother as fully-grown hipster leftist adults who, despite having university degrees and income streams, appear to have continued to rely on the bank of Mom to cover costs.
That lifestyle certainly appears to have left their mother living in somewhat less comfortable accommodation in a state that is often attacked by Democrats for its conservative governance, but which offers lower costs of living than longtime progressive-run New York City. Ocasio-Cortez’s mother seems to have cast something of a vote in favor of Florida with her feet, so to speak.
As for AOC and her brother, it is unclear how they believe people in their income brackets would afford higher taxes to fund participation in Medicare, given the hints that neither of them has proved fully capable of “adulting” in a financial sense well beyond the standard college graduation age of 22 or 23.
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