Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders said Saturday in downtown Los Angeles that the country is in a “extraordinary danger.”
Sanders, 83, wore a blue button-down shirt and Dodgers baseball cap, said President Trump was “quickly moving towards a despotic social form” and shot a crowd of people extending from the big park, heading to the steps of the city hall and into the surrounding streets.
“We’re not going there, Mr. Trump,” Sanders said.
The long-lasting event features Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (DN.Y.) and a lineup of progressive elected officials, labor leaders and musicians, including Neil Young, Joan Baez and singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers.
Sanders said the Los Angeles rally attracted 36,000 people, the largest he has ever seen.
“I don’t have to tell anyone here that this is a difficult time in modern history of our country,” Sanders said. “We have never experienced something like this, but… despair is not an option. Giving up and hiding under the cover is unacceptable. The bet is too high.”
An estimated 36,000 people attended a combat oligarch rally at Gloria Molina Grand Park in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Sanders said Trump and his allies were watching the scale of the rally, “You scared them.”
Except for Los Angeles and Denver, Sanders’ “fighting oligarchs” journey has mostly ceased in areas where members of Congress represent, and Democrats hope to be removed in the 2026 election. The tour started in Omaha in late February and also stopped in Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, Nevada, Arizona and Colorado.
Sanders said he is hiring organizers in some of these regions, including Iowa and Nebraska.
Sanders hasn’t changed his conversation much since his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020.
Billionaire Elon Musk is trying to subvert the federal government through his government’s Ministry of Efficiency, working to end contracts, firefighters and demolitions, and eliminate agencies and departments.
At Trump’s inauguration in January, Musk, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Apple CEO Tim Cook had better seats than his cabinet draft pick.
As the Democratic Party’s popularity continues to sag, the Sanders rally comes. one CNN Poll Organized in early March Frustrated Democrats.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez waving cheering crowds on the stage at Gloria Molina Grand Park in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“Everyone is disappointing, even people we don’t think we won’t,” said Tarzana, 70. She and her husband, Morris Getzels, 73, wore a black T-shirt that matched the red slash of Trump’s face and slogan: “Boycott hatred.”
Both retired Getzels and Pitchon-Getzels said they are using their free time to send emails, make phone calls, write postcards and participate in parades in an attempt to mobilize elected officials and their neighbors.
“Trump has to stop, Democrats have to do that, because the Supreme Court won’t.”
Sanders, a political independent with Senate Democrats, said in an interview that Democrats had a majority in the House of Representatives during the two years Trump was elected, but “almost nothing”.
“In too many cases, Democrats are partisans of the status quo,” Sanders said. “They are not prepared to take on corporate systems and oligarchs, which has caused such great pain in this country.”
Saturday’s gathering will have a festive atmosphere. Content creators pulled attendees into video interviews on the street, some using tiny microphones that were popular on Tiktok. The crowd is a gallery of T-shirts and hats from the 2016 and 2020 Bernie’s campaign, representing classic rock bands and unions for healthcare, Hollywood and construction workers.
Many in the audience also heard about Ocasio-Cortez, 35, a keen, politically savvy democratic socialist who once was the edge of the Democratic Party Enlarge her national appeal.
Ocasio-Cortez told the crowd that what they felt on social media and what they fought for their daily efforts to pay was “logical, inevitable conclusion, an American political system dominated by companies and dark currencies.”
“All of this is what it means to be dominated by billionaires, and what it feels like,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “That’s what the oligarch feels like. And it’s not going to get worse until we take action.”
Teresa Wynne-Rose of Thousand Oaks arrived in the city center at 6 a.m. to secure a place in front of the crowd with her 20-year-old daughter Zoe.
About 20 feet from the podium, two ladies await musical performances and speeches by famous progressive officials, including Los Angeles City Councilmen Eunisses Hernandez and Ro Khanna (D-Fremont) and Maxwell (D-Fremont) and Maxwell (D-Florida) and Maxwell (D-Florida), the first Z member of Congress.
“Berney has been a fighter since his first entry into politics,” said Wynne-Rose, who works for family planning. She said she hopes to see more Democrats take more obvious anti-Trump actions, such as Senator Cory Booker (DN.J.), who broke Senate records this month. 25 hours and five minutes Oppose the Trump administration.
“If I end up having kids in this hell world, I want to tell them I’m here,” Zoe said.
Sanders’ trip inspired others: Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz launched his own City Hall series, with several California Democrats including Khanna and Rep. Robert Garcia holding their own events in the Red Area.
After stopping in Utah and Idaho on Sunday and Monday, Sanders returned to California on Tuesday for an afternoon rally in Bakersfield and had an evening event in Fosson, near Sacramento.
