Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez used a speech before the United Auto Workers National CAP Conference in Washington, DC, on Monday to recast the American flag as a symbol of organized labor and bloodshed by union activists.
The UAW, which represents more than 400,000 workers, framed the second day of its 2026 conference as a campaign against corporate greed and a push on the four core issues that will guide the union into 2028, according to The Post Millennial. Against that backdrop, Ocasio-Cortez leaned into pro-union rhetoric, attempting to redefine a national emblem that many Americans associate with military sacrifice, constitutional liberty, and limited government.
The United States of America, where whose red stands for the valor of Americans, including the labor activists who died and spilled blood so that we could have a weekend and healthcare and dignified wages in this country, she declared, tying the flags colors directly to union struggles rather than the nations founding ideals. The white stands for purity of our intense and commitment to one another as Americans and as human beings. White is the purity of our unity, UAW, the purity of our love for our fellow man. The blue stands for justice and vigilance for one another. But this flag doesn't mean those things just because someone said it. This flag means those things because we do it because we dedicate ourselves and live up to it with our actions. That's what makes this flag mean something.
She then escalated her remarks with a pointed rejection of traditional patriotic pledges, shouting, We do not pledge allegiance to Wall Street, U-A-W. We don't pledge allegiance to greed. We pledge allegiance to no one president. We pledge allegiance to a nation, our nation, the United States of America, to the betterment of all people because when you organize. UAW, when you strike, when you stand together for each other you pour meaning into that flag. You make it mean something to everybody."
After leaving the stage, Ocasio-Cortez took to X to praise the unions agenda, insisting that UAW would fight for an economy that serves the working class, not merely the very few. She also signaled her enthusiasm for May Day, invoking International Workers Day, a date historically associated with socialist movements, underscoring how the modern left continues to appropriate national symbols while advancing an expansive role for unions and government that many conservatives see as fundamentally at odds with the flags original promise of individual liberty and free enterprise.
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