AOC Challenges University Power at Packed “Students vs. Billionaires” Town Hall in Ithaca

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez addressed a packed crowd of students and community members at the "Students vs. Billionaires" town hall in Ithaca, speaking on tuition hikes, sexual violence, free speech and university governance.

The event, held at the Ithaca Downtown Conference Center on September 27, drew roughly 1,200 attendees; organizers say more than 900 additional people were turned away at the door after lining up hours in advance. More Perfect University organizer Elise Joshi said the size of the turnout proved the event’s premise: hand students the microphone and let them set the agenda.

Joshi described More Perfect University — a project of the advocacy journalism nonprofit More Perfect Union — as focused on using storytelling and advocacy reporting to highlight student struggles, from rising tuition and housing costs to limits on campus speech, and to connect those experiences across campuses nationwide. "When you let students ask the questions that matter to them, they're going to ask hard-hitting questions," she told the audience.

The town hall placed campus issues within a wider critique of concentrated wealth and an aging ruling class. Citing Samuel Moyn's new book Gerontocracy in America, organizers argued that an "oldigarchy" of wealthy, long-entrenched leaders has shaped political and economic systems, leaving many young people alienated and eager to re-engage politically.

Student leaders co-hosting the evening included Students for a Democratic Cornell (SDC), Cornell Graduate Students United Union and Cornell Young Democratic Socialists of America. SDC chair Matthew Knudsen said the campus has been "forcefully depoliticized" by policies that limit protests and place pressure on historically political cultural groups. "The university wants students to view the world through an apolitical lens, but as students we have a responsibility to understand how systems driven by politics and ideology impact every corner of our lives," Knudsen said.

Before taking audience questions, Ocasio-Cortez addressed a topic that had dominated campus discussion in the days before her visit: the lawsuit alleging that a former Cornell student, identified as Jane Doe, was gang-raped at the Chi Phi fraternity house in 2024. Ocasio-Cortez framed the matter as a larger failure of institutional accountability.

"Jane Doe, that survivor, lost her education because you can't stay in school when something like that happens to you," Ocasio-Cortez told the crowd. "She had to lose her education, and those men were protected by an institution and granted an Ivy League degree as a reward. Never again."

Organizers said the town hall’s turnout signaled students’ appetite to re-politicize campuses and push institutions to address tuition affordability, sexual violence, free speech, and governance. The event emphasized giving students a central role in shaping campus priorities and in challenging the influence of concentrated wealth on higher education and public life.