When AOC Talked About Freezing Her Eggs, She Probably Didn’t Realize What Else She Revealed

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From the moment she leapt into national politics as the youngest woman ever elected to Congress in 2018, the public has wondered what Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s future holds. What will she do next? Will she run for Senate, or even president? And when? But in recent days, a new question has emerged alongside the ones about her political ambitions: Who will she date next?

Whether it was intentional or not, Ocasio-Cortez’s decision to share her egg-freezing journey with the world resulted in another piece of information about her private life coming to light: Ocasio-Cortez appears to be single. Her relationship with Riley Roberts, to whom she got engaged in 2022 and has been linked with since their college days at Boston University, is reportedly over, and has been over for a while, according to sources as diverse as the New York Times and TMZ. Suddenly, it makes a little more sense why the 36-year-old might be freezing her eggs, and why she didn’t mention a partner in any of her videos about the process.

Roberts and Ocasio-Cortez could look like an unlikely pair physically: she, a polished woman whose preternatural political gifts went along with her impossibly smooth hair and perfect dimples, and he, a relatively normal-looking redhead who towered over her and never looked quite so red-carpet ready. But their long history made their coupling endearing, and AOC’s fans could find comfort in the notion that she was with someone she knew before she became a progressive darling or Fox News target. “I feel like I won the men lottery in my life,” AOC said to GQ after getting engaged in 2022. Her mother was a fan of Roberts too, telling the Daily Mail in 2019, “I love him. He is the most loving, supporting person I’ve seen.”

We don’t know what went wrong but don’t believe the claims that AOC went on a rant on Instagram calling Roberts a “loser” —she hasn’t besmirched him at all, or even outright confirmed a breakup took place. (The “loser” comments were directed more generally toward men who don’t respect women’s rights to make reproductive decisions on their own timeline.) As Ocasio-Cortez spoke about in the egg-freezing series, her position in Congress means that she lives under a microscope, and it’s safe to assume that complicates everything about her personal life. Not that I expect that will stop legions of men and people of all genders from throwing their hats into the ring for a chance to date AOC next. As one viral tweet pointed out, she will have her pick of suitors, à la Penelope in The Odyssey . The controversial looksmaxxer Clavicular has already volunteered his services , though he also claimed to be joking.

The harder part to predict about all of this is whether she’ll be interested in any of her many prospects. So far, Roberts is the only data point we have about what constitutes AOC’s romantic taste, which doesn’t leave us a lot to work with. As far as other famous beefy gingers out there, I’m drawing a blank. She doesn’t have to date anyone, of course.