Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says she's freezing her eggs

US Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has revealed she has decided to freeze her eggs, and has shared her first steps in the process on social media.

The 36-year-old New York Democrat posted the clips on Sunday, hours before telling ABC News's This Week programme that she had not "ruled out the possibility" of running for president.

In the clips, Ocasio-Cortez shows herself taking an injection and talks through tips she has learnt, before answering questions about costs, clinical procedures, storage and how fertility care works under what she calls the US's "broken" medical system.

In her later interview with ABC, she explained that she wanted to "normalise" conversations about the process.

She said it was important "especially in this political environment".

"This administration is denying reproductive care to women across the country, from abortion rights to the ability to carry out a healthy pregnancy," she said. "I think it's important for us as leaders to have these conversations and share these processes," she added.

In her earlier social media post, she said she wanted to share the information even though there was a "political risk" in doing so.

Ocasio-Cortez rarely appears on the Sunday political shows and in her conversation with ABC's Jonathan Karl, she appeared to go further than before at indicating she may run for higher office.

When pressed on whether she was open to a White House run and whether it was a realistic prospect, she said: "I haven't ruled out the possibility and I'm very humbled to the tremendous amount of support out there."

But the focus must remain on the midterm elections in November and not on "individual aspirations or plans", she added.

The congressional elections are held every two years and fall in the middle of the president's four-year term of office.

They are due to be held in early November. Votes will be cast for all 435 seats in the US House of Representatives, while a third of the 100 seats in the Senate will also be up for grabs.

When she was asked about a possible Senate run in New York against Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, the US Senate's top Democrat, Ocasio-Cortez replied that "anything is possible".

A divide between the party's left wing and its establishment, which is embodied by Schumer, has become more apparent in recent months.

The Democratic voter base, which is hungry for radical change, has delivered some big wins in recent primary elections for left-wing candidates who have run against centrist candidates backed by party leadership.

Last week, Abdul El-Sayed won a Senate primary in a key swing state, Michigan, after a campaign centred on Medicare for all, stopping military aid to Israel and abolishing ICE, the federal immigration enforcement agency.

Unlike Ocasio-Cortez, who endorsed him, El-Sayed is not a member of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) but he was supported by some of their leading figures.

In the ABC interview, Ocasio-Cortez said the rise of these new, younger candidates was exciting for the "big tent" of the party and showed this was a "time of renewal".

She also distanced herself from aspects of the DSA platform which appears in the group's guiding document, such as defunding the police and abolishing the Senate.

But she said it was important that her party appealed to a wide audience.

"Democrats have a responsibility to build a winning coalition, and young people are engaging in mediums and conversations that we have a responsibility to attend to and be responsive to," she said.