Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Stolen Shoes Tweet

About

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Stolen Shoes Tweet refers to a mock social media post allegedly by New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in which she accuses Trump supporters involved in the 2021 Storming of the United States Capitol of stealing her shoes. While this tweet does not currently appear on Ocasio-Cortez's Twitter account, many took the tweet as truth and jokingly accused right-wing commentator Ben Shapiro of being the thief due to the height of the person described in the tweet.

Origin

On January 10th, 2021, Redditor carrorphcarp shared the original image of the tweet. It reads, "As most people know by now, many things were stolen during the terrorist insurrection at the Capitol: laptops, mail, even the Speaker's lectern. Security cameras also picked up a well-disguised fellow about 5'4" stealing all of my shoes, for Chrissake. Unbelievable" (shown below).The post received more than 65,000 points (88% upvoted) and 1,300 comments in less than two weeks.

Spread

On January 10th, 2021, Twitter^[1] user @dissentdissent tweeted the earliest known example of the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shoe tweet in response to Twitter user @TheHinduDindu (shown below).

That day, Twitter^[2] user @TheHinduDindu shared the tweet next to an image of a Wojak character with enlarged nostrils and green smoke flowing into its nose. The post received more than 6,500 likes and 680 retweets in less than 24 hours (shown below, left).

That day, Redditor ^[3] My_dick_is_disabled shared a political compass meme featuring the tweet and Wojak image. The post received more than 22,500 points (92% upvoted) and 880 comments in less than 24 hours (shown below, right).

Following the post, people began sharing the post on Twitter, many accusing commentator Ben Shaprio of stealing the shoes. For example, that day, Daily Beast editor Marlow Stern shared side-by-side tweets^[4] of the Ocasio-Cortez shoes tweet and a person accusing Shapiro of stealing the shoes. The post received more than 50,000 likes and 6,000 retweets in less than 24 hours (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

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External References