"Intentional Cruelty": AOC Tells Us What She Saw Inside a Migrant Detention Center

The Mother Jones Podcast

Exclusive interview: Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has used social media and a cunning instinct for politics and publicity to build a megaphone that rivals Donald Trump’s—especially regarding the US detention of migrants who enter the country at its southern border. On Monday, Ocasio-Cortez was part of a 16-member congressional delegation that got a rare glimpse inside three highly fortified migrant detention facilities, which she has referred to as “concentration camps.” Congressional staffers had privately worried that officials would sanitize and curtail their tour inside, but the visit turned out to be more revealing than anyone had expected. A Mother Jones contributor, Jonathan Katz, accompanied the delegation to the sites, though reporters were not permitted inside. Later, he sat down with Ocasio-Cortez to get her perspective on what had happened during the day, how we got here, and where things might go next. Listen to our Q&A with the congresswoman who has catapulted the issue to national attention