Bernie Sanders, AOC rally thousands at ‘Fighting Oligarchy’ stop in Folsom
It doesn’t have to be this way, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., told thousands of supporters at a Folsom rally Tuesday evening.
“It is not a radical idea,” Sanders said, that “in this country, every man, woman and child can and should have a decent standard of living.”
But he said hundreds of thousands of people sleep on the streets every night and millions more spend more than half their income on housing.
The message echoes the populist, worker-focused agenda Sanders ran on during his 2016 campaign for president. And it’s the message the self-described democratic socialist and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have been bringing to huge crowds as they travel to mostly Republican areas of the country on a “Fighting Oligarchy” tour.
Beneath a balmy, breezy spring sky, an estimated crowd of 30,000 people gathered on the track field at Folsom Lake College Tuesday to hear the progressive leaders speak. Throughout much of the event, a single-engine plane circled above trailing a banner that read “FOLSOM IS TRUMP COUNTRY!”
Clad in a light blue button-down, navy coat and a Folsom Lake College trucker hat, Sanders warned of the “dangerous situation inherent in Trumpism” and the growing power and influence of his wealthy supporters.
“We believe in a government of the people, by the people and for the people. Not a government of the billionaires, by the billionaires and for the billionaires,” he said.
Sanders and other speakers painted a dire picture of a country at a crossroads, where the rights and economic well-being of Americans is being eroded while the nation’s wealthiest grow richer.
“We must acknowledge forthright the terrifying moments that we are in right now,” Ocasio-Cortez said, citing cases of foreign-born residents with legal status, such as Mahmoud Khalil, Rumeysa Ozturk, and Kilmar Abrego Garcia, “being disappeared off the street.”
“The destruction of our rights and our democracy is directly tied to the growing and extreme wealth inequality that has been building in America for years,” Ocasio-Cortez said, adding “it’s not a coincidence” that Tesla CEO Elon Musk poured more than $250 million into helping elect Trump in 2024.
Both progressives criticized Rep. Kevin Kiley, the Republican representing Folsom and hundreds of miles along the eastern border of California, for supporting a House budget plan that could cut $880 billion from Medicaid.
“Kevin Kiley knows that this is not what you want,” Ocasio-Cortez said, drawing loud boos by invoking Kiley’s name. “He knows that it hurts the people of Folsom but he is not there to serve working families. He is there to serve himself and the billionaire class that put him there.”
In a blog post published earlier Tuesday, Kiley said Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez “didn’t take me up on my offer to debate them” and said the rally “might be the last gasp for socialism in California.”
While the event focused mainly on President Donald Trump and the influence of billionaire donors including Musk, both Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez took shots at Democratic elected officials who trade stocks and take campaign money from corporations.
The multi-hour event featured performances from local musicians and speeches from labor leaders including Lorena Gonzalez, president of the California Labor Federation, and Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, a union representing more than 820,000 federal employees.
The labor leaders played to the Sacramento area’s large public-sector workforce, criticizing leaders of corporations like Starbucks and Amazon for union-busting and warning of recent moves to lay off thousands of federal workers.
Turnout for the event was larger than anticipated. Organizers said Wednesday that 20,000 people had RSVP’d but 30,000 showed up. At one point, according to Sanders’ campaign, the line to get into the event was three miles long.
One of the rally-goers, Carolyn Watkinson, 65, of Merced said she has been involved in politics since the 1970s and said the country is at a “turning point.”
“Democracy hasn’t ever been on the line like this before. I mean, I disagreed with George Bush on a lot of things, but I never worried that he was gonna sell our country out,” she said. “I just can’t sit home and not be involved.”
Sanders began his “Fighting Oligarchy” tour in February, as Musk was regularly appearing at the White House alongside Trump.
The string of rallies also comes as the national Democratic Party flounders with uncertain leadership and messaging following the 2024 election loss. A March CNN poll found just 29% of Americans have a favorable view of the Democratic Party.
Is Folsom ‘Trump Country?’
The Sacramento-area event is the latest in a speaking tour that has mostly been held in Republican-dominated areas. Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez visited Idaho and Utah before returning to California on Tuesday.
Watkinson applauded the two for traveling to red areas around the country to speak, especially since congressional Republicans were urged not to hold in-person town halls in their districts.
“The Republicans wouldn’t come out and face their own constituents. So if they’re leaving a vacuum, I’m glad that Democrats are trying to fill that,” she said.
Counter-protesters posted up on street corners outside the college campus, waving pro-Trump flags and gathering signatures for the latest effort to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom from office.
“I’m not a fan of communism,” said Matthew, a 45-year-old Folsom resident who declined to give his last name. But he said he hoped rally attendees “have a nice time” and “be safe.”
“I don’t mind that they’re all running around. It’s good for Folsom. They’re gonna have to eat and drink and do all those things. Just stay out of trouble,” he said.
Matthew, who was holding one end of a giant “Recall Gavin Newsom” banner, called himself a “total Trumper.”
“He’s smart and he knows what he’s doing,” he said, “and everyone needs to think about the last four years when he was in office, 1.4% inflation, strong military, no wars.”
The Folsom event is one of the final stops for a West Coast leg of Sanders’ speaking tour. He and Ocasio-Cortez will hold a rally in Missoula, Mont., on Wednesday.
This story was originally published April 15, 2025 at 9:34 PM.
