Almost 700,000 people flock to Twitch to watch Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez play the “Between Us” video game

President Trump has hangar gatherings, Joe Biden has social distant events. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, an actress from New York, who is 31, has … an alien spaceship.

She got aboard that craft tonight to play Between us, A surprising multiplayer video game that has achieved huge popularity among Twitch celebs over the past few months. (Players race around the cartoon ship, complete quests and try not to get killed.) Nearly 700,000 people watched her play with multiple broadcasters and fellow Democrat Congressman Ilhan Omar of Minnesota. At the peak of the broadcast, about 440,000 people went to AOC’s Twitch Stream, while 200,000 or so watched the separate broadcasts of Pokimane, Jacksepticeye, HasanAbi and Moistcr1tikal.

The evening had a purpose beyond the game. Before the start Between us, AOC has urged those who watch Twitch to vote in the upcoming presidential election. “We are here to vote in blue,” she says. “We have the ability to vote for Trump out of office, to vote for the Biden-Kamala card. Let’s make sure we change this country.” She took a minute to then scan the game UI, and moved her cursor to the volume controls, which increased the volume. “Look how terrifying this music is,” she said with a laugh. “Sorry, I’m just kind of putting this together.”

AOC’s Twitch Stream is an amazing new use of the streaming platform that nearly 40 million people in the United States watch every month. However, its popularity has been largely restricted to those interested in games, and it is certainly not where elected officials usually go to convey an important political message. But for a perspective on the AOC toss, consider the number of people who attended to witness Tyler “Ninja” Blevins’ triumphant return to Twitch after defecting from a rival streaming service: Blevins, the most famous professional player, drew about a fifth of a crowd during the event in August.

AOC’s virtual campaign idea meets in about a day. The congresswoman tweeted to the 9.1 million followers on Twitter that she wanted to play Between us And he asks who wants to participate. In May, I did something similar and played Animal Crossing: New Horizons With several people I met on Twitter, another trick seen as noticeable progressive thinking since that game has also had a lot of success among the youth, a demographic that politicians often struggle to communicate with. Biden has his own presence in the game as well. Branded in-game Animal crossing Players can visit and talk to a digital personal copy of the Democratic Candidate.

After its initial tweet yesterday, AOC spent several hours trying to get the equipment needed to stream it on Twitch – including webcams – and made the futile journey to Best Buy
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Much of it has been sold. Twitch HQ discovered her tweet and contacted tech support.

AOC started playing the match around 9 pm on Tuesday. Several rounds of Between us After 90 minutes, she was still hunched over her keyboard, as she enlarged her character with the pink blanks around the blackboard. Attendance dropped slightly to 366,000 people after it was broadcast live.