AOC Is Engaged: 7 Fun Facts About Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Boyfriend Riley Roberts

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., on Thursday announced that she is engaged to her longtime boyfriend Riley Roberts following rumors about their relationship status.

In a statement to The Business Insider, Ocasio-Cortez said she and Roberts got engaged during a trip to Puerto Rico in April. She added that they are still taking some time before they begin planning for their wedding.

"We got engaged last month in my family's hometown in Puerto Rico," she said, according to The Insider. "No future details yet, we're taking some space to savor this time before diving into planning."

Not much is known about Roberts as he has largely stayed out of the spotlight. He and Ocasio-Cortez have kept details of their relationship mostly out of the public eye. However, here is what we know about the lawmaker's fiancé.

1. Roberts is the son of a real estate agent who grew up in a wealthy area in Arizona.

2. Roberts graduated from Chaparral High School in nearby Scottsdale. During his time there, Roberts won several statewide honors in the public-forum debate.

3. Ocasio-Cortez met Roberts when they were both undergraduate students at Boston University. They first met in 2011 at the university's weekly debate event, Coffee and Conversation.

"Every guy went through their phase where they had a crush on her," Eric Baker, Ocasio-Cortez’s friend, said in the biography Take Up Space: The Unprecedented AOC.

4. According to Baker, Roberts had been the Ocasio-Cortez's “sparring partner” on campus, adding that he would constantly stir the pot when the debate began to go around in circles. "Riley was just like, 'This is dumb. Why are we all going around in a circle saying the same thing?' He enjoyed intellectual combat," Baker said.

5. Ocasio-Cortez's and Roberts' friends were unaware they had been dating until years after graduation. The pair broke up after they finished school but later rekindled their relationship.

6. While Roberts has largely stayed out of the spotlight, he appeared in the 2018 documentary “Knock Down the House,” which chronicled Ocasio-Cortez’s primary campaign. Rachel Lears, the documentary’s filmmaker, said Roberts played a key role in supporting the Democrat's career in politics.

"Everything from the emotional to the strategic to the practical, he has been a really important partner to her," Lears said.

7. Roberts built several websites for small businesses after college. He also did marketing for an online home-management service before he began working as a web developer, according to the New York Post.