Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) drew attention Sunday during an event on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference after criticizing remarks made by Secretary of State Marco Rubio about American cowboy culture, as reported by The Gateway Pundit.

Ocasio-Cortez appeared at a TU Berlin event alongside German Bundestag member Isabel Cademartori, where she was asked about her prior comments in Munich advocating for wealth redistribution and taxing the wealthy.

The discussion turned to Rubio’s speech at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday, where he emphasized historical and cultural ties between the United States and Europe.

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In his address, Rubio referenced Christopher Columbus and described the influence of various European groups on early American development.

He noted that English settlers brought language and political systems, Scots-Irish settlers carried the pioneer spirit, and German farmers and craftsmen contributed to early agricultural growth.

Rubio also said, “Our expansion into the interior followed the footsteps of French fur traders and explorers whose names, by the way, still adorn the street signs and towns’ names all across the Mississippi Valley. Our horses, our ranches, our rodeos – the entire romance of the cowboy archetype that became synonymous with the American West – these were born in Spain. And our largest and most iconic city was named New Amsterdam before it was named New York.”

During Sunday’s panel, Ocasio-Cortez said Rubio’s speech was “a pure appeal to Western culture.” She highlighted a specific portion of his remarks.

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“My favorite part was when he said that American cowboys came from Spain,” she said. “I believe the Mexicans and descendants of African slave— enslaved peoples would like to have a word on that.”

Ocasio-Cortez then expanded her comments to address broader themes of culture and inequality.

“Culture is changing. Culture always changed. Culture, for the entire history of human civilization, has been a fluid, evolving thing that is a response to the conditions that we live in,” she said.

“And so, they want to take this mantle of culture. At the end of the day, though, is, you know, it is very thin. And so the response that we have to have is, again, it’s material, it’s class-based, it’s common interest.”

She also spoke about the reception to her economic message in Munich.

“I think the old way is realizing that they’ve had their way. They’ve had their economic deals structured exactly the way that they wanted it. They’ve had their, you know, all, all of the ways you can govern, they’ve had their way in doing it, and they are losing ground,” she said.

“So I think while there’s, uh, there was certainly more openness to what I was saying than probably there would be in years past. We can’t underestimate the appeal of going back to these well-worn grooves.”

Ocasio-Cortez added, “A lot of what we talk about when we talk about a class-based internationalist perspective also means ending the hypocrisy towards the global south.”

“That is a challenge that is difficult for much of the typical crowd at Munich to hear,” she continued.

She also referenced Venezuela during her remarks.

“You know, we look at what happened in Venezuela, for example, it is not a uh, it is, it is not a remark on who Maduro was as a leader. He canceled elections. He was an anti-Democratic leader. That doesn’t mean that we can kidnap a head of state and engage in acts of war just because the nation is below the equator,” she said.

The exchange followed Ocasio-Cortez’s participation in conference events throughout the weekend, where issues of economic inequality, global policy, and cultural identity were debated among international leaders and lawmakers.

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