Inside the socialists' civil war over AOC and 2028

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez 's potential run for president has exposed long-simmering divisions within the Democratic Socialists of America .

Why it matters: The socialism movement's leaders are increasingly at odds over who should speak for them, what policies they stand for — and whether to support AOC , whom some dismiss as more establishment than insurgent.

Driving the news: Political success brings scrutiny, and some DSA members and strategists who work with the group don't think its current leadership is ready for prime time ahead of the 2026 midterms and the 2028 Democratic presidential primary.

"We're not in a book club anymore," said one strategist who works with the DSA.

"You could be growing this organization by pointing to AOC, Bernie [Sanders], [Zohran] Mamdani — and instead they are going on cable news talking about abolishing the Senate, Fidel Castro and other weird stuff.

It's a blown opportunity." "The ways that we operated in the past are now making headlines in ways that we didn't expect," Priscilla Yeverino, the DSA's communications director, acknowledged in an interview with Axios.

"Our leaders aren't politicians," Yeverino added.

"They're working-class people and new to doing media.

It's been a learning experience, and they are listening to our members' feedback." The DSA's critics point to several unforced errors made just when the group has been having more success in primaries than it's ever had: In July, the national DSA published a "Workers Deserve More" platform that laid out the group's political vision, including several controversial proposals such as abolishing the Senate, defunding the Department of Defense, and working toward "fully abolishing the police and prison system." Many DSA and DSA-friendly politicians were caught off-guard by the new agenda, and several — including AOC — quickly distanced themselves from the group.

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Megan Romer, a national DSA co-chair, had trouble articulating her organization's positions in a podcast interview with the New Yorker's David Remnick.

When Romer dodged a question on what she meant by "taxing the hell" out of the rich and powerful, Remnick pushed: "If you're the co-chair of the DSA, shouldn't you be more specific than 'taxing the hell' out of something? What exactly do you mean?" Romer appeared to be caught off guard and replied, "That's a good question" before trying to answer further.

When Remnick asked if Romer would have her concerns about Israel and Gaza satisfied with the 2000 Camp David Summit proposal , Romer said: "I need to look at what the actual specifics there were, I don't know them off the top of my head." 3.