Before anyone made an announcement, it was obvious from the noise in the hallway. Behind the silent brick face of a building housing twenty-four classrooms, there are squeals, the sound of tiny chairs scraping against the walls, and someone laughing. On a Friday morning at Horizons for Homeless Children in Roxbury, that was the sound that greeted Ayanna Pressley, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Michelle Wu. It wasn’t a sound from a press conference, but rather a sound from a school day, which appears to have been the exact intention.
The three women did more than simply take a tour. They read “Ambitious Girl,” a picture book by Meena Harris that, appropriately, features a character based on Pressley herself, while sitting on the floor with a class. That detail is almost too tidy, the kind of coincidence that a novelist would overlook as being overbearing. However, it did occur, and the children seemed to enjoy it, which is a tiny bit of information about what really works with a room full of young children.
No one usually makes time to visit Horizons. It provides free services to families in need for over 200 infants, toddlers, and preschoolers residing in shelters throughout Greater Boston. In 2021, the center relocated to its current 140,000-square-foot location, which is more akin to a small campus than a daycare and features sensory rooms, STEM labs, and outdoor play areas nestled between Egleston and Jackson Square. Pressley has made prior visits, such as in 2024 to commemorate receiving a million dollars in federal funding for emergency childcare assistance. She brought reinforcements this time.
Following the visit to the classroom, the three had a private meeting with the Parent Council, which does more than just comment on decisions at Horizons. The warmth of story hour gave way to something sharper when the press became available. Pressley made reference to the administration’s stance on the Iranian conflict, drawing a comparison between its willingness to finance childcare and its spending on war. Ocasio-Cortez linked her appearance to the Child Care for Every Community Act, which she and Senator Warren had co-signed. Wu cited Boston’s expanded universal Pre-K as evidence that investments yield tangible outcomes rather than merely talking points.
It’s important to note what this visit wasn’t. When a reporter questioned Ocasio-Cortez about whether the trip indicated greater aspirations, it wasn’t a rally, and no one pretended otherwise. This was a reasonable question considering the rumors surrounding her future in 2028. She diverted attention to the policy, which may or may not allay the rumors but at least kept the day’s attention where the three women seemed to want it.
But it’s not the politics that stick with you. Terrell Mosley, a teacher, claims that just being there was a sign that Horizons is “heading in the right direction.” Or the center’s focus on play as something more akin to medicine than recreation, which is based on trauma-informed design decisions that most visitors would never notice, such as classrooms filled with beanbags and dolls rather than worksheets and hallways intended to help kids burn off energy.
For reasons that seem almost too straightforward to be purely political, three women with very different occupations and audiences ended up in the same tiny chairs for the same hour. Perhaps they weren’t. Perhaps the argument was about showing up.
