When it comes to Twitch, it seems AOC is doing A-OK. US Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York returned to the gaming site Friday for a livestream of her and others playing the hugely popular social deduction game Among Us and in the process helped raise $200,000 for people in need during the coronavirus pandemic.
"We did it!" AOC said in a tweet. "$200k raised in one livestream (on a whim!) for eviction defense, food pantries, and more. This is going to make such a difference for those who need it most right now. Thank you all."
The five-hour-plus livestream followed one from late last month, in which AOC played Among Us in an effort to get out the vote for Election Day. That stream, which saw AOC gaming alongside fellow Squad member Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, became one of the most watched in Twitch's history.
Read more: How to play Among Us online, and why it's suddenly so popular
Ocasio-Cortez's Twitch efforts are just the latest example of politicians adopting web-era approaches to reach new audiences. Last June, during his presidential campaign, near-octogenarian Bernie Sanders launched a Twitch channel, hoping to tap the internet-platform-du-jour to get his message out to younger voters.
And earlier this month, after the presidential contest between former Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump was called in favor of Biden, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris posted a web-casual smartphone video on Twitter showing her dialing up Biden to congratulate him.
Perhaps most famously (or infamously), Trump has used Twitter over the last four years to sidestep mainstream media and try to take hold of the political narrative.
lookwhaticando47 on November 29th, 2020 at 03:12 UTC »
Younger people need to be in politics.
Method__Man on November 29th, 2020 at 01:05 UTC »
I watched it from Jagmeet's stream (NDP party leader in Canada). They were chatting and a some point, she was all down to business to play the game.
Was funny watching the dude as it was his first time playing and he kept getting killed.
overall looked like they were all having a good time
Mr_Sleep_tight on November 28th, 2020 at 23:53 UTC »
When a representative does more for pandemic relief playing a video game than our government can do in 6 months.