Jae C. Hong/AP Photo
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) acknowledge the cheering crowd during the “Fighting Oligarchy” event in Los Angeles on Saturday.
By the time Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) took the stage, 36,000 people had crowded into Gloria Molina Grand Park in downtown Los Angeles to hear her and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). They crowded onto the lawn, standing on closed-off streets or even sitting on the steps of Los Angeles City Hall to share their anger at Donald Trump and Elon Musk, but also to hear what could be done about the state of the country.
Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez have been making their way around the country since February on their “Fighting Oligarchy” tour, which seems to be gaining momentum as the full extent of Trump and Musk’s policies takes hold. The crowd in Los Angeles was the biggest one yet. Even with many out of town for the Coachella Music and Arts Festival—where Sanders would make a surprise appearance Saturday night alongside Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-FL), who also spoke in Los Angeles—the event was a hot ticket. People piled in early, well before musicians Maggie Rogers, Joan Baez, and Neil Young took the stage. “Berniechella” was where to be.
The crowd included some longtime Sanders supporters, those who had voted for him in the 2016 and 2020 primaries. Others were Democrats and progressives looking to register dissent. For others, Saturday’s event was their first big political event. One part unified them: They were angry.
So were the speakers. Onstage, Sanders repeatedly called out Trump and the administration’s attacks on the social safety net and government programs. “We’ve never gone through anything like this, but this is what I do want to say,” he said. “Despair is not an option. Giving up and hiding under the covers is not acceptable. The stakes are just too high.”
The crowd agreed. Joshua Sawyer, watching from the top of one of the park’s hills, was new to this kind of political engagement but said that the events of the last three months got him out, in part because of the lack of opposition from high-profile Democrats in office. He said that many elected officials need to start standing up for everyday people, and not “bend over backwards to make Trump happy.“ He wants them to feel the pressure. But he also gestured to the crowd and said the turnout made him feel better.
Shortly after Neil Young wrapped up, Leslie Ota watched the stage and said she was there in part to exercise her right to protest—“one of the few remaining rights.” This was also her first major rally. “It’s important to stand up and show we’re going to keep fighting for unity and bringing together the country that’s stronger together with multiple different types of cultures and individuals with lots of different backgrounds,” she said. She called out the underlying racism in the country and the divisiveness being stoked, noting that her grandmother was a Japanese American who was interned at Tule Lake during World War II.
Sen. Sanders: “I’m no longer talking about how we’re moving to oligarchy. I’m talking about how we are living today in an oligarchic form of society.”
Kirstin Davis said that she had always been “mildly” active and engaged in politics, but the situation in the country had changed. “I always thought, ‘Oh it will work out, oh that might not be a great situation, but not everything is going to hell.’ And now it’s like everything is going to hell. I’m worried about my children, my daughter, the rights she’ll have.” She described the current moment as “disheartening,” even though Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez, as well as the large crowd, were giving her faith.
Beyond their anger at the current state of the country, many people the Prospect talked to said they were surprised and encouraged by just how many showed up for the rally. Sanders referenced it as well. “Let me tell you, Donald Trump looks at this crowd, they pay attention. Elon does too. You’re scaring the hell out of them,” he said. “They know what you know and I know—that they are the one percent, we are the 99 percent.”
Like the rally that drew 34,000 to Denver, Los Angeles was a unique stop on the tour. The “Fighting Oligarchy” rallies have mostly been held in red or purple districts where there are Republican representatives. At a time when those elected officials are ducking out of town halls when confronted by angry constituents, the two progressive members of Congress have been tapping into that anger.
But in Los Angeles, they were joined by several local leaders and officials, including progressive Los Angeles City Council members and speakers representing unions in Hollywood or striking mental health workers. The speakers touched on several ongoing crises, from the abductions and attempted deportations of activists such as Mahmoud Khalil and Rumeysa Ozturk to the war in Gaza, from climate change to housing affordability and corporations concentrating their wealth. They used each example as a part of the wider danger and damage being done by the billionaires in the United States and their allies in politics.
“This has been the big-money playbook, not just now but for decades,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “That is why Donald Trump is not an aberration, he is the logical, inevitable conclusion of an American political system dominated by corporate and dark money. And if we are going to defeat him, we must defeat the system that created him.”
Sanders also took the time to call out DOGE head Musk, noting that the billionaire had recently mocked him for talking about the dangers of oligarchy in America for decades.
“The difference is I’m no longer talking about how we’re moving to oligarchy. I’m talking about how we are living today in an oligarchic form of society,” he said. “Three months ago, when Trump was inaugurated, standing right behind him during his inauguration, were the three wealthiest people in this country, Mr. Musk, Mr. [Jeff] Bezos and Mr. [Mark] Zuckerberg. And right behind them, were 13 other billionaires who Trump had nominated to head up major federal agencies. And that, brothers and sisters, is what oligarchy is all about.”
Many in the crowd were also concerned about the state of the economy and what it meant for their futures. Kris Dominguez, a 31-year-old who recently earned a master’s degree, said he came out in part because of the economic difficulties. He noted the amount of money being put into war, but wondered why that wasn’t being used to help fight homelessness or help others inside the country. Many, including other millennials like him, are stuck working double shifts to try and get by while the United States has so much money.
Mariana, who declined to give her full name, said she came down from Santa Barbara to attend the rally with her son. She said she had protested during the Vietnam War and was in Grand Park in response to the “catastrophe” created by Trump since January.
“Half of my income is Social Security,” she said. “I have twin autistic grandsons who rely on [Supplemental Security Income] and our lives will be impacted tremendously by what happens,” she said. “I want a revolution. I want the whole thing to flip.”
That won’t be easy, the main speakers conceded, given the wealth and power of the ruling class. But they encouraged solidarity in the face of a fight that will go door-to-door, workplace to workplace.
Ocasio-Cortez pointed to recent acts of local resistance in Los Angeles. She specifically called out an incident a few days earlier, when ICE agents tried to enter two Los Angeles Unified School District schools, falsely claiming they had permission from parents to enter. School staff turned them away.
“It will never be just institutions and officials alone that uphold our democracy,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “It will always be the people, the masses, who refuse to comply with authoritarian regimes who are our last and strongest defense of our country and our freedoms.”
