'We are living in the middle of a fascist coup': Pelosi opponent Saikat Chakrabarti holds first major rally in San Francisco

Saikat Chakrabarti, who is running in the Democratic primary to unseat former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, held his first major campaign rally on Wednesday at a packed venue in San Francisco.

The upstart candidate held his first large-scale event at The Chapel, a church converted into a popular music venue, in the city's Mission District, with around 700 in attendance.

Chakrabarti has until now worked mainly behind the scenes in politics, having been part of Bernie Sanders' 2016 presidential campaign, served as the campaign manager for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and then worked as her chief of staff when she was elected to Congress in 2018.

On Wednesday night, under bright red lights and a cheering crowd of hopeful—and in many cases jaded—supporters, he laid out his vision for what he believes could be a more progressive voice in Californi's 11th congressional district.

"This is about an overwhelming demand for change right now," Chakrabarti said to a cheering crowd.

He pointed to recent raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents (ICE) in Chicago and around the country, often separating families.

"We are living in the middle of a fascist coup," he said bluntly. "Our Democratic leaders in DC, they need to be taking this moment seriously. This is not politics as usual."

Chakrabarti is part of a growing number of young progressive candidates challenging Democratic establishment leaders, some of them incumbents.

His candidacy comes as US President Donald Trump is polling underwater at a 38 per cent job approval rating, according to an August report by Pew. At the same time, the Democratic Party seems to be faring even worse, with a July Wall Street Journal poll finding only 33 per cent of respondents view the party favourably.

Multiple polls have pointed to a somewhat disenchanted Democratic electorate, indicating that voters do not find it sufficient for candidates to run solely on an anti-Trump platform. Data for Progress released a report in March, which found that Democrats are not united on a party leader and that only 17 per cent believe Schumer is doing enough to fight Trump.

Many progressives see this as an opportunity, not only to bring the fight to Trump, but also to interrogate a system that led to his rise.

"It's not just about Trump. There's been something deeply broken in our economy and our society for quite some time now," Chakrabarti said to applause.

He described his financial success as a Silicon Valley tech engineer as fortunate for him, but not a measure of hard work compared with nurses and janitors. He then pointed to the New Deal (creating jobs, infrastructure and social safety nets) and the civil rights movements in improving people's lives.

Chakrabarti then pointed to the next stage in US history as the time when politicians aligned themselves with corporations and billionaires, ushering in an era of deregulation, diminished labour movements, and cutbacks to welfare programmes for the middle class.

"Our economic decline did not start with Donald Trump. Our economic decline made Donald Trump possible," he said.

"Because when Democracy doesn't work to make people's lives better, that paves the road for a strong man to come in and say: I alone can fix it. That your problems are trans people or immigrants or scientists," he added, describing those who have followed this messaging as desperate for change. For that reason, he emphasised that he does not want to go back to a pre-Trump status quo.

He went on to outline his plans for Congress, including supporting a Green New Deal, universal healthcare, affordable education, affordable housing, public utilities, a ban on congressional stock trading, ending big money in politics, and ending funding for endless wars.

"If I am elected, I will vote to end all military funding to Israel," he said, drawing the loudest and longest applause of the evening.

These policies, though popular with the public, have generally not been supported by Pelosi. Though she still enjoys relatively high popularity in her district, she is increasingly seen as not meeting the moment. An internal poll by Chakrabarti's campaign, conducted by Beacon Research, found that 51 per cent who had supported Pelosi in the past now thought it was time for a change.

"Nancy Pelosi has done a good job. As a young person, I respect her and her status as a woman in politics, but also I feel like the party hasn’t really been progressing forward," Pooja Muddasani, a local software engineer at the rally, told The New Arab. "In the Trump era, I feel like people have lost hope, and I feel like the energy of this campaign is bringing some hope back."