Darializa Avila Chevalier, the 32-year-old democratic socialist candidate who ousted Rep. Adriano Espaillat in last week’s New York Democratic primary, told MS NOW on Monday that she is not a communist, responding to a CNN report on old social media posts in which she appeared sympathetic to communism.

Asked in a phone interview if she was a communist, Avila Chevalier said: “I’m not. I’m a democratic socialist.”

She called the focus on such rhetoric a “distraction.”

“The point isn’t whether or not I say it, the point is that they’re going to be reactive and trying to evoke a reaction to engage in that kind of distraction, and so what I’m trying to say is, I can say it until I’m blue in the face that I’m not a communist; I’m a democratic socialist,” Avila Chevalier said. “But that is again part of that distraction, where I now have to spend more time talking about that than actually addressing the issues for my communities.”

The posts, which CNN said came from a since-deleted account, included one lamenting the lack of Marxist literature in public libraries. Asked about it, Avila Chevalier said she believes “in freedom of speech, and believe[s] in making sure that we have access to all types of thought.”

“In an era of book bans, I think it’s important that we actually know what it is we’re criticizing,” she said.

Avila Chevalier defeated Espaillat after a campaign in which she defended controversial old social media posts voicing far-left policy positions, such as a desire to abolish prisons.

On Monday, she told MS NOW she wanted to use her power in Congress to transform the United States into “a society where we don’t have murders.”

“We need to start really rethinking what has allowed this kind of violence to exist in our society, and how do we reduce it,” she said. “So making sure that we’re actually investing in the programs that are proven to reduce that — mental health services and healthcare and housing and dignified social systems — are really at the heart of what we can do from a congressional level to make sure that our communities not only feel safer, but are safer.”

Avila Chevalier acknowledged that convicted murderers going to jail “is just the reality of what is going to happen.”

“But what I’m presenting is a vision for what we should have,” she said.

The post Avila Chevalier, after primary upset, says she is not a communist appeared first on MS NOW.

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From MS Now.