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By Gwen Aviles and Dartunorro Clark
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez left Friday the ivory halls of Congress to send one in Queens for a fair salary.
The 29-year-old democrat found her roots in mixology and found behind the Queensboro restaurant bar, dashing margaritas and vodka sodas to defend the interests of the workers who rely on the tip.
"It's so real that you will experience a lot of exploitation, harassment and labor violations because of the clever work structure," Ocasio-Cortez told a hundred clients. "All the work has dignity and the way we give dignity to the job is to give people the value and respect that they are worth to the minimum."
Ocasio-Cortez shared his own experiences as a bartender with low salaries and convenient customers. Before beating Joe Crowley at the Democratic primary last year, she served drinks and waiting tables at Flats Fix, a Mexican restaurant in Union Square.
"I remember working in a restaurant and people say something wrong or affect you and it's the 28th of the month and you have a rent check to pay," he said. she declared. "You were more likely to reject sexual harassment on the 15th of the month."
Aeesha Polanco, 32, a single mother who works in a restaurant and as a massage therapist, is one of the voters of Ocasio-Cortez and has knocked the Queens Bar to support the legislator.
"I rely on tips to make ends meet and I can not count on a weekly salary," Polanco said. "This leaves me more vulnerable to sexual harassment, than I have lived with clients, colleagues and management.The adoption of a" fair wage "would give me the opportunity to deal with these situations. "
Under the Fair Wages Act, a lower minimum wage in some states for workers who receive tips would be eliminated and their hourly wages increased.
The Ocasio-Cortez event was organized by the Restaurant Opportunities Center United Group, or ROC, which invited Governor Andrew Cuomo, Democrat, to support One Fair Wage in New York.
Ocasio-Cortez credited his work in the service sector to sharpen it "razor detector BS " After being congratulated for addressing painful questions to former President Donald Trump's lawyer, Michael Cohen, at a bold hearing before Congress in February.
And defenders who spoke on Friday of NBC News said that they were grateful for his local perspective in Washington.
"She has the knowledge that only a person who has worked in the industry can know," NBC News Serena Thomas, 27, who heads the OCR chapter in New York, told NBC News.
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