WASHINGTON — Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) brushed off speculation about a 2028 White House run during appearances touting her foreign policy vision on the world stage Friday — but she couldn’t put her finger on the “single-biggest” shift that occurred under President Trump.
The “Squad” rep appeared on two panels at the Munich Security Conference in Germany, answering questions about ongoing conflicts between Russia and Ukraine, widespread protests in Iran and the current state of US diplomacy.
But Ocasio-Cortez, 36, played coy when asked about her own presidential ambitions or whether her opposition to US aid for Israel should be a litmus test for the Democratic presidential nominee in two years.
AOC didn’t rule out a 2028 White House run. Getty Images“So when you run for president, are you going to impose a wealth tax or a billionaire’s tax?” New York Times correspondent Katrin Bennhold asked the congresswoman when talking about “the rise of populism.”
AOC stifled a laugh and sidestepped the question: “I don’t think that anyone — and that we don’t have to wait for any one president to impose a wealth tax. I think that it needs to be done expeditiously.”
She also refused to say 2028 Democratic candidates should condition aid for Israel, but offered that the “idea of completely unconditional aid, no matter what one does, does not make sense.”
“I think it enabled a genocide in Gaza,” Ocasio-Cortez claimed.
At the second panel, the Bronx and Queens Democrat was unable to articulate the most significant change in Trump’s foreign policy when pressed by moderator Francine Lacqua of Bloomberg TV.
“I think this is a moment where we are seeing our presidential administration tear apart the transatlantic partnership, rip up every democratic norm, and really call into question the rules-based order,” AOC said. REUTERS“The single-biggest?” Ocasio-Cortez asked for clarification, laughing slightly.
“Well, I think zooming out beyond just this presidential administration,” she rambled, “I think that what we are seeing is — between President Trump’s first administration pulling out of long standing international agreements; then you have President Biden, who is opting back into some of them, such as, for example, with the Paris Climate Accords, and then you have President Trump that’s elected again — I think what we are seeing now is this idea that US foreign policy is — and some of our more basic and foundational values-based commitments seem to be enacted based on the partisanship of whoever is elected.”
“We play hokey-pokey with USAID,” she added of Trump’s shuttering of the US Agency for International Development, “with the Paris climate agreement, with many of our commitments — and I don’t think that that is good for the country.”
“And so I think that instability is one, but then the other, I think, it is hand in hand with the volatility on one hand. It goes far beyond just agreements, and it goes into real aberrations, I think, in interventionism, in, I think, a turning back on our commitment on human rights, as well as supercharging an economic regime that fuels the 1%. And I think that that that piece is the most concerning for everyday people,” she concluded.
During the morning event, Ocasio-Cortez accused the Trump administration of “wrecking ball politics” and warned that the US is tearing apart its alliances.
“I think this is a moment where we are seeing our presidential administration tear apart the transatlantic partnership, rip up every democratic norm, and really call into question the rules-based order.”
She further argued that while the Trump administration is reshaping US policy, “that does not mean that the majority of Americans are ready to walk away from a rules-based order.”
Ocasio-Cortez said she traveled to Munich to “tell a larger story” — that the American public remains committed to democracy and global partnerships despite Trump’s “very grave” actions. APOcasio-Cortez said she traveled to Munich to “tell a larger story” — that the American public remains committed to democracy and global partnerships despite Trump’s “very grave” actions.
“We are in a new day and in a new time,” she said. “But that does not mean that the majority of Americans are ready to walk away from our commitment to democracy.”
U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) speaks during the Munich Security Conference (MSC) in Munich, Germany, February 13, 2026. REUTERSThe “Squad” member also warned that “hypocrisy is vulnerability” in foreign policy while making none-too-veiled digs at Trump’s foreign policy actions over the past year.
Among the examples she cited were “kidnapping a foreign head of state,” “threatening our allies to colonize Greenland,” and “looking the other way in a genocide” — respectively alluding to the arrest of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro and Trump’s support for Israel during its war with Hamas.
“We are here, and we are ready for the next chapter,” she said. “Not to have the world turn to isolation, but to deepen our partnership and increase commitment to integrity and our values.”
Asked which institutions a future Democratic administration would seek to recommit to, Ocasio-Cortez responded: “First and foremost, I think we need to revisit our commitments to international aid — not just USAID, but the dozens of global compacts that this current Secretary of State and President Trump have withdrawn from.”
“They are looking to withdraw the United States from the entire world so that we can turn into an age of authoritarianisms,” she added, claiming that Trump was happy to allow Russian President Vladimir Putin to “saber-rattle around Europe” as long as the American president could “command the Western Hemisphere and Latin America as his personal sandbox.”






