Incoming members of the Democratic Party's new U.S. House majority say they're ready to turn the energy of their campaigns into real power on Capitol Hill.
Rep.-elects Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and a handful of other liberal-leaning incoming Democrats used an orientation event for freshman lawmakers Tuesday sponsored by the Harvard Kennedy School's Institute of Politics to stake out some of their top issues – from gun violence to health care to climate change.
They say they're ready to leverage their victories at the ballot box into victories in Congress — an institution that prizes seniority.
Pressley said power is about more than just how many terms a lawmaker has served.
"It's a confluence of things. It's about the committees that we'll be appointed to. It's about the values- and issues-based caucuses that we'll serve on. And it's about us simply leveraging the platform that we have available to us as well as our social media networks," Pressley said.
Democratic congressional candidate Ilhan Omar reacts after appearing at her midterm election night party in Minneapolis, Minnesota. VOA
Pressley won election to the House by beating a fellow Democrat – longtime U.S. Rep. Michael Capuano – in a September primary.
Ocasio-Cortez said like-minded incoming Democratic members of the House have the numbers needed to press their case for change.
"We have a magic number in the House … and it's 218," she said. "Two hundred and eighteen is the magic number to get things done and how many member Democratic freshmen do we have? Sixty Three. Sixty-three of that 218 is brand new and 35 of that 63 have rejected corporate PAC money, 35 of that 63 is not funded by opioid companies, not funded by the NRA, not funded by for-profit health care, not funded by fossil fuels. Thirty-five are independent of the interests of corporate influence."
Like Pressley, Ocasio-Cortez also won election by defeating another veteran Democratic incumbent – Joe Crowley – in New York's June primary.