[Sat. March 16, 12:30 p.m.: Story updated with comment by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez' Chief of Staff Mike Casca.]
WASHINGTON — Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez issued a press statement last week prominently highlighting her partnership with religiously-inspired anti-porn lobby NCOSE, an organization that seeks to criminalize all sex work and eradicate adult content, and that has an extensive, well-documented history of championing state censorship and opposing LGBTQ+ rights.
The statement released by Ocasio-Cortez’s office celebrates her introduction of the Disrupt Explicit Forged Images and Non-Consensual Edits Act of 2024 (DEFIANCE Act), which proposes to create a federal civil right of action for victims of deepfakes.
The statement prominently features NCOSE, formerly known as Morality in Media, as the second in a long list of organizations endorsing the DEFIANCE Act, and closes with a full quote by NCOSE CEO Dawn Hawkins stating, “The proliferation of nonconsensual, sexually-explicit ‘deepfake’ images has exploded online, harming hundreds of thousands and threatening to harm anyone who has a photo online. It is past time that our laws catch up and hold the perpetrators of this abuse accountable! The DEFIANCE Act is a critical step forward allowing a path to some justice for survivors through civil remedies. This federal law will surely stop many abusers from creating this exploitive content!”
XBIZ contacted Ocasio-Cortez’s office and her Communications Director Sidney Johnson, for comment on whether the congressperson is aware of NCOSE’s history, past stances against free speech, promotion of censorship and opposition to LGBTQ+ rights. XBIZ also asked Ocasio-Cortez to comment on her partnership with Hawkins, a religious conservative activist who has spoken extensively about the Mormon roots of her War on Porn crusades and her efforts to rebrand Morality in Media as the more secular-sounding NCOSE.
After this story's publication, Ocasio-Cortez's chief of staff, Mike Casca, contacted XBIZ via X offering as the office's official statement the following: "Bullshit. It's not a partnership. She has a bipartisan bill to stop nonconsensual deepfake pornography that centers survivors' civil right of action. Orgs left, right and center support it. Bipartisanship is how bills become law in a divided congress."
Casca declined to answer any follow-up questions specifically about NCOSE, particularly as to how the foregrounding of the anti-porn lobby — it's listed second in a nonalphabetical list of more than 30 endorsing organizations and Hawkins' quote is one of only two offered by any of those groups — constitutes "bipartisanship."
The Washington Blade Calls Out NCOSE
Earlier this week, Christopher Kane from LGBTQ+ politics site the Washington Blade also noted the peculiar alliance between NCOSE — which generally partners with religious Republicans for its campaigns — and Ocasio-Cortez, a notably progressive New York representative and member of “The Squad.”
Aides to Ocasio-Cortez did not respond to a request for comment from the Washington Blade, about how “the move appears to conflict with her history of supporting the LGBTQ community and reputation as one of its most loyal allies in Congress.”
Kane pointed out that although Hawkins’ quoted remarks “are inoffensive and germane to the legislation,” the NCOSE CEO has appeared insincere in the few statements she has made trying to backpedal her organization’s staunch opposition to LGBTQ+ rights since its creation in 1961 as pro-censorship, clergy-aligned group Operation Yorkville.
The Washington Blade listed repeated and recent incidents of NCOSE staffers and board members opposing LGBTQ+ rights. Kane also pointed out that the group is “primarily focused on opposing pornography,” a term that for NCOSE has included, in the recent past, the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue and Cosmopolitan magazine.